Whispered no Kangen
by Cairnhawk
Summary: Can Sousuke recover from grevious wounds and rescue Kaname from Amalgam's clutches before she discovers the dangerous secret of the Lambda Driver? Can Kaname fend off Leonard and discover the true power of her Whispered abilities in time to help Sousuke?
1. Chapter 1: Waiting for Something

_REFERENCE NOTES: _

_This story is set after all three anime seasons of Full Metal Panic, the light novels "Dancing Very Merry Christmas," "Continuing On My Own," and "Burning One Man Force." I suspect it takes up somewhere in the middle of "Get Together And Make My Day," but as there's no English translation yet available past "Continuing" you'll just have to take my word for this. If you haven't read the novels at boku-tachi. net, I highly recommend you do so. It will make some of the references to past events much easier to understand, and I'm afraid spoilers are unavoidable. Any information regarding events past "Continuing" has been picked up from one or two of the Full Metal Panic discussion boards, where hints and teasers regarding the actual contents of as-yet untranslated novels are examined under the microscope of otaku obsession and poked with the pointy stick of wild speculation._

Disclaimer of the standardized kind: I SO do not own or make money off of FMP, its universe or its characters. So, no suing, please.

* * *

**Chapter One: Waiting for Something**

Kaname Chidori sat up suddenly in bed, gasping for breath. Yards of white sheets had been twisted about her while she struggled with unseen terrors in her nightmare, and she kicked ferociously free of them to place her feet on the cool, smooth surface of the terracotta tile floor. She brushed aside the heavy veil of mosquito netting that draped the antique four-poster bed gracing her new suite of rooms, and stumbled slowly to the tall French doors, flanked by wide windows, set in the far wall of her bedroom, which all looked out across the shellstone-paved expanse of patio. She paused for a moment, forehead pressed against the thick, wavy glass panes of the doors, before throwing the latch open and stepping out onto the terrace, where her hair and nightgown were instantly whipped around her by the wind sweeping in across the ocean.

The morning sun was peeking over the mountains behind the villa, casting pale pink light down the stucco walls of neighboring buildings, touching the far side of the bay, and making the distant waves sparkle gold. Underneath the cliffs the villa was built upon, she could see the wide, white beach cast in charcoal shadow. It would be hours before the sun dried it out. Even her terrace was still in shadow. The wind was chilly, and smelled of salt and wet clay roof tiles. It cut viciously at her cheeks and her bare shoulders, lashing her arms with whips of her own long, black hair. She folded her arms across her chest, shivering in the wind. Thunderclouds of gray and blue were racing past overhead, taking the early morning rain with them as they swept across the tiny Caribbean island and back out to sea.

This was Kaname's new morning ritual. Three months ago, she would lie abed, listening to her infernally cheerful alarm clock telling her to get up. She would take a long, leisurely, hot shower. She would eat breakfast, check that she had all her books and homework, lock her apartment behind her, and head to school. She had even started waiting for _him_ to join her on the street between their apartments, instead of making him catch up with her at the train station or school.

Now she woke early, often in a cold sweat. She feared her dreams. Most of the time, she watched helplessly as Leonard placed Belial's foot on the chest of the doomed Arbalest, and stomped the cockpit flat, hydraulic fluid spraying viscously across the asphalt, and coiled fibers of memory plastic muscles snapping loose from their titanium bones like silly snakes from a can. Sometimes, she just heard _him_ say, "Don't do it...I will bring you back…" and she would wake with tears soaking her pillow.

She had made a new habit of standing on the balcony and watching the sunlight march towards her, fingers gripping tightly to the carved railing of the terrace, eyes on the sea, face expressionless. After a while, she would go back inside, and take a quick shower in the extravagant bathroom, done floor-to-ceiling in gray-veined white marble, stocked with piles of fluffy white towels and cleaned daily by a silent maid. She would ring for breakfast to be brought up, dress herself, eat, and then be escorted to the laboratory, where she spent the rest of her day in indentured servitude to Amalgam's Research and Development Department, a servitude clad with the genteel veneer of unnecessary luxury. She had everything any girl could want at her fingertips. All she had to do was ask – clothes, jewelry, food, books, music, the attention of a handsome and polished young man – but Kaname wasn't any girl, and the young man's refined exterior hid a manipulative, cold, and calculating heart. She longed for freedom, not things.

Kaname wrenched her eyes from the hypnotic glitter of sunlight on the waves to glare at one of the few things preventing her from climbing over the balcony rail and taking her chances with the Venom units patrolling the island. She really did have everything - including her very own Arastol. The beastly thing was hunched in the back corner of her terrace, a deadly deterrent to any rescue attempt by Mithril – should anyone be left of that organization at this point – as well as her sole attempt at escape two weeks after being brought here.

* * *

She had been standing on the balcony railing, balancing in the night breeze, and calculating the jump to the narrow cliff below the terrace, thinking about what Sousuke had said about the dark of the new moon, when something had seized her by the ankles. She'd screamed and pitched forward, only to be caught by a ruthless fist in her hair. A second scream, this time of pain and fury, and floodlights had flared, frantic footsteps had pattered through stairwells, and Leonard - followed by half a dozen human guards - had burst through the bedroom's patio doors with an inscrutable look on his face.

The Arastol had not even turned its head to look at its creator – it simply grated out, in that emotionless mechanical voice,

"Action five-three-point-two. Complete. Release on your command."

Kaname had stood there fuming, waiting for Leonard to tell it to let her go, but moments passed and he simply stood there, silent.

"Well?" she'd finally demanded, temper getting the better of her fear. She was afraid that her escape attempt would negate Leonard's promise to let Sousuke live.

"It's waiting for you, Miss Kaname. It will answer to your commands, not mine." She'd turned her head a bit, hair still trapped in the Arastol's gauntlet. There. That was an expression of cool amusement on his face, she was sure of it.

"That's stupid," she'd snapped. "What's going to stop me from telling it to let me go, or better yet, carry me down the cliffside?" She'd paused, and then turned to the Arastol. "Let go already, you piece of junk!" she'd shouted, and then caught her balance as it swiftly released the death-grip on her hair and ankle, ungracefully dropping to a crouch on the balcony rail.

"This activity is going to become very tiresome should you decide to repeat it on a regular basis, Miss Kaname," Leonard had sighed, and before she could slap his hands away, he had caught her about the waist and lifted her gently down to the ground. "The Arastol will follow your orders in any regard to protecting you. However, it will not throw itself off a cliff, drown itself in the ocean, or assist you in escaping. You should really expect more from me," he'd added, meeting her glare with a calm face. "I went to a lot of trouble to convince you that Tokyo had nothing left to offer you."

That was all it had taken to bring hot, angry tears to her eyes. Before they spilled down her cheeks and exposed her weakness for everyone to see, she'd muttered, "Let go. Let go, and get out of here. I was just… I just want to go to bed." She'd shoved him away roughly, and stomped past him to stand at the doors into the bedroom. "Out!" she'd repeated, angrily, pointing.

The security team had marched past her, silent, single-file. Leonard had paused on the threshold, his back to her, the sweep of his ash blond hair spilling in perfect waves down the back of the black coat he always wore. She idly wondered how much time he spent brushing it-

"I don't wish you to consider me an enemy, Miss Kaname. I meant every word when I said I'd fallen for you. How could I not? You are truly unique. I would hate to lose you. Of course, you are welcome to attempt an escape at any point, as I am confident that you could not possibly succeed." Here he paused, and tucked his hands casually into his pockets.

"However," he continued, his voice holding a note of steely resolve, "if I should find that you are injured…or have perished… in the process of escaping, or by your own hand, you will not be the only one to suffer. I'm sure we understand each other."

Kaname's breath caught in her throat in horror. She did, indeed, understand what he meant. She could try escaping, but if she died in the attempt – a slip and fall from the cliff, an errant shot by a guard, an over-enthusiastic Venom pilot crushing her in his hand…not to mention, Leonard somehow knew that she had been momentarily torn between a leap to freedom and a leap into oblivion. It had been a difference of a few feet…but any such move on her part would be matched by retribution on his part, and she did not doubt his sincerity, or his ability to make good on the threat. He gave her regular updates on Kyouko's health, her sister Ayame's grades in school, and her father's work in the U.N., since she was not allowed to contact any of them herself. She knew she could loose any of them at any moment, and it terrified her. Of course, news on the one person who meant the most to her…was completely unavailable.

With those words, Leonard had guaranteed her cooperation. She could easily gamble with her own life, but not with the lives of her loved ones. He knew it. She knew it. He had bowed his head respectfully towards her, and left her rooms, black coat floating behind him like a cape.

That had left the Arastol on her balcony, servos humming quietly as it waited with inhuman patience for its next order. She had eyed it warily from her doorway, wondering what would happen if she were to kick it in the shin. She knew from experience on the _Pacific Chrysalis_ last December that the autonomous A.I. functions were limited in scope, and while it could be trusted to carry out simple orders on it own, complex directives were beyond its capacity.

"Fine, fine. My commands," she had muttered under her breath, not expecting the miniaturized A.S. to straighten and say,

"Your instructions?"

She blinked in surprise, then recovered herself and growled, "Just wait wherever it was that you were hiding before you grabbed my hair!"

"Clarification required," it rumbled, in that deep, synthesized voice.

"Take up your previous post," she had temporized, realizing that she would have to take the time to find out what its programmed objectives consisted of, if she didn't want to spend hours trying out various commands to get what she wanted.

"Roger," it replied, turning, and disappearing into the shadows of the terrace's far corner, where the eaves of the tiled roof hung down before sweeping up into a vault over the main building. It hunched up under the vastly oversized green trench coat that had been draped around it, and she could hear the hum of electronics fade as it powered down for standby mode. A shiver crawled up her spine as she was suddenly reminded of the sound Fei Hung's neck had made, snapping in the relentless grip of Leonard's Arastol. And Leonard wanted this thing sitting outside her bedroom all day?

* * *

She had become as accustomed to its presence as possible during the past weeks, but it still creeped her out when it would suddenly move in the corner in response to the perceived threat of an occasional small plane far overhead, a patrolling A.S. on the beach, or a wheeling, raucous flock of seagulls. She had learned quickly not to feed them on her balcony. There were _still_ stains in the corner.

Kaname turned on her heel and walked back into the villa, leaving the doors wide open so that the cold ocean wind would help sweep the stuffy air of her suite clean. She knew the maids kept everything spotless, but she couldn't help but feel that her presence alone shed the dust of self-doubt and apathy on everything she touched. Surely the rain-laden winds could sweep it clean while she showered.

A short time later, she was wrapped in a thick bathrobe and was toweling her hair dry, as she picked up the phone in her sitting room and asked the housekeeper to send up breakfast. She dressed as she waited, pulling a t-shirt over her head and twirling her damp hair into a twist that she deftly pinned in place on top of her head before she pulled on jeans and sneakers. She laid a sweater over the back of a chair in the sitting room to take with her to the lab, which was kept uncomfortably cold in favor of the massive amounts of computer equipment. She answered the gentle knock at her door with a kind smile for the maid, but it slid off her face almost immediately when she saw who was holding her breakfast tray.

"Leonard," she said flatly, standing in the doorway with her hand still on the handle.

"I was on my way to speak with you anyway, so I offered to bring your plate up," he said with a smile, as if they did this everyday. "If you don't mind stepping aside…" he trailed off pointedly, nodding at the sitting room. She slowly moved out of his way, holding the door open stiffly as he swept past her and set the tray on the small table beside her reading chair.

He busied himself with the tea things, a small cultural change that she had grown to appreciate over that past couple of months. She thought wistfully of Tessa as Leonard deftly poured English tea from a delicate teapot into an equally delicate cup, dropped a sugar cube into it, and then pointed at the tiny milk pitcher with a questioning look on his face. She gave him a blank look at first, suddenly remembering what Tessa had said about the dangers of extended Whispered resonance, and the way the milk had clouded the tea as she had explained that at some point, it was impossible to separate one mind from another. She shook her head, accepted the teacup from him, and tried not to cringe as his fingers gently brushed hers in passing. He set her plate on the side table and smiled benignly at her.

"The kitchen staff must like you," he said softly from his seat on the sofa across from her. "I was told there weren't any left." That aggravating smile was still hovering around his lips. He pointed at the unsuspecting scone on the plate in front of her, which had been accompanied by bacon, eggs, half a grapefruit, and a bowl of rice. The kitchen's previous attempts at a real Japanese breakfast of miso soup, rice, natto, pickled radish, and rolled omelet had been somewhat disastrous. For now, rice was enough.

"I, unlike some people, can be nice without wanting something in return," she muttered bitterly into her teacup. She sipped slowly, closing her eyes against the hurt look on Leonard's face. _His occasional acts of kindness did not entitle him to forgiveness of his other sins, _she sternly told herself. _It doesn't matter if he's offended. He's a bad person. It's the truth. I will _not_ sugarcoat it!_

"There is a new project that I want you to spend some time on," he said, as if nothing had occurred to upset him. "We have had several groups working on it and have made little progress, and I have…other duties. I think it's time to see what you can do with it." He stood. "Finish your breakfast. You will be brought to the new lab this morning." She nodded silently, absorbed in staring at the bottom of her cup through the deep golden brown of the tea, watching as it slopped up the sides as she twirled it gently in her hands. "Please give this your full attention, Miss Kaname," he added, as he walked towards the door. She didn't look up, just nodded again. She heard the door shut quietly, and fought down the violent urge to hurl the cup at the door. It would only amuse him. And it was one of her favorite cups.

Half an hour later, hair dry and up in a ponytail, her sweater pulled on over her shirt, she was past a retinal scan and being led down a hallway in the restricted area of the labs, which was awfully silly since the whole operation screamed 'secretive!' and she was sure there wasn't a single truly innocent soul past the first guard desk. They were deep inside the cliff, and the walls were of poured concrete at least a meter thick. This facility was definitely designed for defense. Everything was a depressing shade of battleship gray, and the flooring had an unpleasant rubbery feel. It squeaked under the soles of her sneakers.

She was brought up short in front of a pair of double doors. The black-clad guard escorting her peered down his nose at her as if about to confer some kind of honor, then swiped his security card through a reader and stepped aside as the doors whisked open. She stepped through, and spotted Leonard and several scientists in white lab coats standing to the side of a long table full of computers. At the far end was a massive _something_ draped in a white cloth. Her curiosity got the better of her, and she wandered towards Leonard, knowing he would be eager to explain. He acknowledged her with a nod of his head, and continued answering whatever it was that one of the scientists had asked about.

"…if that is the case, then we need to consider dismantling all but the core, and try injecting new material. Procurement shouldn't be too hard after a week or two." His glance flicked to Kaname and then away, and she felt a fleeting stab of apprehension. "Regardless, this is an opportunity that cannot be missed. I expect you to allow Miss Kaname free rein, and provide her with whatever technical support she needs."

Leonard turned to Kaname, and with a graceful flourish, indicated the cloth-covered item at the end of the table. The rest of the room was empty, expectant. "Here it is. I don't doubt that you will recognize it." He gestured for the other scientists to remove the shroud. "I am hoping it will recognize you," he smiled. The fabric fluttered as it was yanked from one side, and Kaname gasped in shock as she stumbled backwards.

It was a scene right out her nightmares – the half-crushed, battered remains of Sousuke's ARX-7 Arbalest lay in a pathetic heap on the floor of Amalgam's research bay. She could hear, far off, someone screaming. It took her a moment to realize that the person screaming was her.

* * *

**A/N:** First fanfic, so have at it! Seriously. That being said, I am trying to get this story out of my system before Gatou-sama makes it impossible for this to be even remotely canon. However, I'm dying to see what "really" happens, so I'm torn: Hurry up! No, uh...wait...give me a few weeks...! Next chapter: We see Sousuke gear up to resume the search for Kaname. Go, Sousuke! 

Updated on 9/13 - Nothing major, just fixed a few typos, clarified a few details. Still working on Ch. 2 & 3. I am determined to work in the new info from the latest issue of the FMP story...but there's only so far I can go before I'm going to have to divert from canon…(sigh). Hope to see Ch. 2 this weekend. Thanks for reading!

Updated on 12/14 – Just a tiny bit of editing, plus the "Notes" paragraph.


	2. Chapter 2: A Good Start

_REFERENCE NOTES:_

_Beware! Crusty old Marine who drinks coffee that is eight parts bean and three parts water, and swears a blistering blue streak. Yes, this is canon, I promise! Well, not the coffee part, that's me drawing from my personal experience with crusty old Marines. Truly, there is no greater friend, no worse enemy…especially when you suspect they keep a grenade in their pencil drawer. You have been warned for sporadic appearance of a (censored by hyphen) word that is rated "R."_

I SO do not own or make money off of FMP, its universe, or its characters. So, no suing, please.

* * *

**Chapter Two: A Good Start**

Sousuke Sagara much preferred the feel of the tawny Florida sand thundering beneath his boots as he ran to the feel of sitting quietly, watching the gulls wing gracefully over the waves. In moments of silent contemplation like this, he would loose his inner battle with the feelings of loss and self-disgust that had taken root in his mind. His face remained impassive while his inner thoughts wrestled furiously. The balance between his former life and his current state had reached critical mass – he could not reconcile himself as a soldier and the look Kaname had given him that night, four months ago – the same night that Leonard Testarossa had been waiting for them in her apartment. The silver-haired young man had left without much violence, but with a few choice words, he had trailed in his wake a fog of discomfort, distrust, and dejection that had attached itself to the young pair.

"Chidori," he mumbled, absently shredding a piece of sea-bleached rope between calloused fingers. It was one of many random items of mutilated sea wrack that had collected around him by now. He'd been on a run with a squad of Force Recon Marines and had continued down the beach when they had headed into the ocean for laps between shore and a far-off buoy. His wound wasn't quite healed enough to join them, according to the Navy medical officer who'd been examining him since his arrival. His special dispensation from the Lieutenant Colonel meant that the Marines had so far tolerated his presence without a word, silently allowing him a spot in the ranks as they pounded across wave-packed sand in the pre-dawn light, bearing sixty-pound packs. Sousuke could feel the small stabbing pain in his gut every time he breathed in, but pushed past it. He could almost hear the Lieutenant Colonel bellowing in his ear, _Pain is weakness leaving the body!_ He couldn't help but agree.

The sun was lifting itself halfway past the horizon when Sousuke stood and dispassionately surveyed the pile of debris he'd produced in the last fifteen minutes. It had taken far too long to return his heart rate and breathing to normal pace. This hateful weakness was yet another side effect of the rifle bullet he had taken in the gut, a yawning chasm between the state his body currently occupied and where he needed to be. Most days, he felt as if both Lemon and the Lieutenant Colonel – who, despite his foul mouth and harsh workouts, kept a cautious eye on Sousuke at all times - were watching him for signs of imminent collapse. He rather enjoyed disappointing them so far, but it was still a conscious daily effort to keep his back straight and his face composed.

He turned and began a slow jog back the way he'd come. Sousuke no longer needed to watch where he put his feet, or concentrate on the mechanics of running. At first, he had been clumsy and slow, like a newborn colt. With his coordination recovered, his mind was free to wander. The past month had seen great strides on his part towards recuperation from the bullet that shredded a kidney, damaged his liver and part of his intestines. It had left a ghastly mark across his abdominals, a deep wound now edged in angry red scar tissue. Eventually, it would fade to gray and join the rest of his collection.

He wondered if Kaname would mind that there was now less of him. He wondered about her often. Sometimes he dreamed about her, brief flashes of her face, and her lips shaping mysterious words as she was lifted away in the palm of Leonard's Belial. What had she been trying to say? The blood in his eyes and her hair being whipped by the wind had obscured his vision, and he wasn't sure he'd read her words properly. Some nights it was, _find me_. Sometimes, she said _don't follow me_. Most nights she just said, _I'm sorry_. He would wake, shaking, some nameless emotion crushing him, and be restless for the reminder of the night.

Doubt filled his heart like ice water. How could he even think that she would want to be near him? That she might want him to stay with her when – if he could – he returned her to Tokyo? He didn't deserve her trust. He didn't deserve to be someone she relied upon, cried on, held onto. The look on her face when Leonard had compared him to a serial killer was not easily forgotten. It was as if her eyes had reflected a red-eyed, soulless demon back at him. Her fear of him had been palpable, an invisible morass that he could not reach her through. She had actually pulled away from his touch, when only minutes before they had been holding hands.

Sousuke stumbled over a piece of driftwood that had been half-buried in the sand. He recovered himself, and continued jogging down the beach, trying to concentrate on his footing. Now was _not_ the time to break an ankle.

He was a soldier, a mercenary, and as such had carried out orders to fight and kill. It was true that it had not always been in self-defense, or to spare innocent lives. He had been a killer, a murderer on command, and had initially treated the dealing of death as a matter of necessity, efficiency, or practicality. Even in his earliest memories, he could distinctly feel the cool detachment that had encased him as he brought crosshairs to bear on the head of unsuspecting victims, breathed in, breathed out, aimed, and slowly squeezed the trigger. Even in close range assassinations, he had been ruthless, professional, and swift – dispatching assigned targets without the burden of thought.

With the failed assassination of Majid, the Badakhshan Tiger, and subsequent adoption into the freedom fighters, his life had taken a sudden turn. The ferocious, uncoordinated violence of the mujahideen had swept him up in their storm of religion-driven fervor against the Soviet invasion, and his adolescent days had been spent in caves and dry valleys, clutching whatever variant of the AK-47 had come to hand, a twist of cloth across his nose and mouth to filter the sand from the air. His days and nights had been a rapid succession of explosions, long dusty marches, and the rattle of machine gun fire, until the first day he had become the pilot of a captured Soviet RK-91 Savage.

Joining Mithril had, again, changed his way of life drastically. Warfare was no longer a desperate personal struggle for survival. Instead, carefully considered strategic engagements took shape under the hands of military experts, and while the plans rarely lasted beyond initial engagement with the target (as regularly happens to plans), their strikes were often surgical in nature and as such, collateral damage was kept to a minimum. The enemy - drug cartels, slave traders, dealers in black market technology or body parts or weapons - always deserved what they were dealt.

Didn't they?

Sousuke reached the end of his run and turned towards the boardwalk that paralleled the ocean. He could see Michele Lemon, undercover counterespionage agent of the French _Direction General de la Securite Exterieure_– the DGSE - perched on the third step up off the beach in casual clothes, casually smoking a cigarette, and watching the low Atlantic waves scrub the beach flat. They nodded at each other as Sousuke stood in front of him, stretching his abused muscles. After a while, Lemon spoke, his voice light and casual.

"So, Sagara…what do you think she's doing right now?"

The question caught Sousuke off guard, even though he had spent most of the morning thinking about Kaname. He couldn't even begin to form a reply, but Michele just shook his head.

"Never mind." He exhaled smoke. "It's not good to dwell on it too much."

"No," Sousuke agreed for the sake of agreeing.

"I received new orders last night."

"Is that so?"

"DGSE is willing to involve a _Division Action_ team in your mission in exchange for additional information. For example, the Ministry of Defense is very interested in the source of the abilities of the Arm Slave you piloted in Hong Kong."

Sousuke snorted in annoyance. "I told you, that A.S. was destroyed in Tokyo. There's nothing left. Someone hauled away the wreckage." A mixed feeling of relief and regret washed over him at those words. After Hong Kong, he had suddenly found himself able to depend on the combination of the Arbalest and Al, the A.I. They had succeeded in several sorties, using the power of the Lambda Driver. It had failed him in Tokyo against Leonard and the Belial. Now he was on his own again. Using ordinary equipment to perform ordinary missions - isn't that what he had wanted?

Lemon raised an eyebrow, and a slightly amused expression flitted across his face, as if he knew something Sousuke didn't. He let the comment pass. "If that's unavailable…" he shrugged. "Free rein to examine any and all materials belonging to Amalgam during your…girl hunt…would be an ideal resolution. Satellites, stealth machinery, advanced A.I.s, weaponry, anything we can get our hands on."

Sousuke's face was stoic, but internally, his head nearly spun on it axis. If France got their hands on Black Technology, it wouldn't be long before industrial sabotage, arms trading deals, and covert ops spread the advanced military capabilities of Mithril and Amalgam to armies around the globe. The inherently violent nature of man would cause the world to turn on itself and self-destruct spectacularly, aided by the secrets of the Whispered. His stomach clenched. This was the coin he would have to pay to retrieve Kaname? Lemon already knew about her importance – how else could Sousuke explain the significance of retrieving one single, solitary girl from the embrace of a massive, secret mercenary organization? Had Lemon passed the information about the Whispered on to the DGSE? Would Kaname and every other Whispered be gaining another adversary through his attempts to save her?

"This must be discussed with the Lieutenant Colonel," Sousuke said, stalling. More experienced heads than his must be brought to the table to negotiate what help was needed, what information could be used, and the terms of payment involved.

As the sun cleared the line of the ocean and bathed the beach in hot yellow light, he stood up, and with Lemon, trudged back to the nearby parking lot where a dark government SUV waited for them. They would be driven back to the unassuming corporate building that housed the Marine Corps division of the U.S. Southern Command headquarters, where they were being accommodated by Lieutenant Colonel John George Courtney, USMC, Retired - the only remaining member of Mithril, and the acting commander of Mithril's South Atlantic fleet, that Sousuke had been able to contact.

* * *

Lieutenant Colonel Courtney thumped the heels of his (no longer regulation) spit-shined black combat boots gracelessly on the fold-up card table that had been set in the middle of the tent. He crossed his arms on his chest and leaned back in his rickety-looking chair, surveying the stoic, dark-haired young man in front of him from underneath wild, bushy, sand-colored eyebrows. His leathery skin was tanned in a reverse-raccoon mask; dark where the sun had scorched it, light where his UV-blocking goggles had been pressed into the orbital bones. The card table was covered with maps of South America, weighted down here and there with objects to keep them from lifting off in the mid-morning breeze coming through the tent flaps from the hot, yellow-green edge of the Florida Everglades – a Ka-Bar fighting knife, two cups of black coffee that resembled used motor oil, the Lieutenant Colonel's over-starched cover, a battered-looking coconut, and a Glock 18 that had been broken down for cleaning.

The two men were reviewing the intelligence compiled between the DGSE and the CIA as a result of the information Sousuke had forced out of Kurama, and Sousuke was eyeing the messy pile of papers with an unconvinced look on his face. They had accompanied a platoon of Marines that were practicing maneuvers in the steaming sawgrass swamp of the Everglades a few miles away. Courtney was along on the maneuvers as a consultant; having been involved for many years in the Southern Command's war-on-drugs-mission, and regularly spent time educating the platoons that rotated through the Miami headquarters in matters of the terrain, weather, and culture that they would encounter in their area of deployment. A few support staff members and a medic had remained at the temporary base, along with the troop carriers and the Humvees. This left the retired Lieutenant Colonel and his guest in the commander's tent to discuss one Miss Kaname Chidori's whereabouts with some degree of privacy.

"You've got your work cut out for you, son," rumbled the Lt. Colonel, showing a shocking amount of restraint with the F-word. "Nikero is easy. Grenada will take a little while to scout the islands. But San Carlos…" he trailed off. "There are a dozen places she could be. Such a vague reference leads me to believe it's the most likely." The front chair legs slammed to the ground as he suddenly sat up. Maps rustled noisily and one of the coffees pitched to the ground, where the contents stood trembling for a moment on the hard-packed sand, refusing to sink in.

"Here we go, in no particular order. San Carlos, Chile. About 50,000 people, 365 klicks south of Santiago, primarily agro industry. Lots of orchards. Set between two rivers. We'll have to be careful, trade agreements between the U.S. and Chile have been stepping up in friendliness, and we can't afford to twist their panties. Not to mention, the Chilean Army is one of the most professional and technologically advanced armies in Latin America." Courtney tapped the map with a pen. "That's one."

"One?" asked Sousuke, knuckles white on the hand clenched around his water bottle. He was sitting quietly in the other camp chair, dressed in the latest uniform issue: the new Marine Corps pixilated-pattern desert camo BDU's and hot weather combat boots. He had unbuttoned his jacket so he could check for signs of heat or tenderness around his nearly healed wound, the signs of possible infection. His abdomen was still wrapped tightly in bandages, and he surreptitiously held a hand over the location of the entry wound, testing for soreness.

"Lance Corporal!" bellowed Courtney suddenly. "Front and center!"

"Sir!" replied a Marine, appearing suddenly in the tent entrance and saluting crisply.

"If you would be so kind," the Lt. Colonel said, jerking his chin in Sousuke's direction.

"Aye, aye, Sir!" the Marine replied, and stepped forward. Without another word, he landed a powerful right hook right in the younger man's gut, drawing a deep grunt of pain from Sousuke, who broke out in beads of sweat across his forehead but kept his seat.

"Thank you, Lance Corporal. Dismissed!" Courtney returned to the pile of maps.

"Sir!" The Marine saluted, about-faced, and marched himself out of the tent again. The Lieutenant Colonel didn't bat an eyelash.

"Now then, second option. La Fortuna de San Carlos, Costa Rica…the largest cantón in the country, part of the Alajuela province. Note the presence of an active volcano. And cows, " he added, as an afterthought. "Supplies half the milk in the country."

"_Cows_? Why is it on the list?" grunted Sousuke, wiping the sweat off his forehead.

"There's a branch of the Costa Rica Institute of Technology located there. It would be good cover for a research facility. Plus, the active volcano provides seismic cover for any kind of digging or weapons testing." Courtney picked up the remaining cup of coffee and downed half the contents.

"Third option," he continued, setting the coffee down. "San Carlos, municipality of Morazán, El Salvador. We're willing to rule this one out due to continued geologic instability in the region. Mudslides, earthquakes, and the like. We don't think they would build a facility with sensitive electronics in this region."

"Fourth option, San Carlos, Belize. Farming village of about 200, also involved in excavation of Mayan ruins in the area. Too small, Amalgam would stick out like a sore thumb." Courtney turned over a map, and pulled out one showing the southern continent's Atlantic coastline.

"Fifth option, San Carlos, East Falkland Island. Also, Port San Carlos, same island. However - and bear in mind that I'm basing this on what I know of Captain Testarossa and her brother - I don't think the South American equivalent of Scotland moors will be considered a suitable location for Miss Chidori. You did say that Leonard Testarossa promised her 'hospitable treatment.' Coming from him, I interpret that to mean a relatively gilded cage for our bluebird."

"Yes," Sousuke growled. "He told her, 'I want you to throw away the life you have now and come with me. You don't have to worry. Of course, since I guarantee your hospitable treatment, I promise you a prosperous life to do as you please. An institution has been prepared just to fulfill your intellectual interests, and first and foremost- it is completely safe.'" Sousuke frowned deeply. "Was he implying that she has other organizations to fear besides Amalgam at this point?"

"Amalgam is the biggest shark at this stage of the game. That doesn't mean there aren't little sharks in the water, waiting for their chance. The decimation of Mithril has chummed the waters." He chuckled evilly. "And Kaname Chidori is still an untapped Whispered entity. Mithril was focused on protecting her from the KGB; they never had the time to determine her specialty. From your field reports, we extrapolated some possibilities, but never pursued them."

Sousuke met the Lieutenant Colonel's eyes reluctantly. "The Lambda Driver," he whispered. "Shun On."

"Among other things," Courtney replied, calmly, and picked up the coffee cup again. "Weber's report from Shun On included her reaction to drugs administered in the test facility…and subsequent commentary on the ECS system's weaknesses. Captain Testarossa noted a Whispered response in her report from the Ariake incident with the Behemoth. Let's also not forget her involvement in the thwarted sea jacking of the Tuatha de Danaan, and her interaction with 'Dana' in the TAROS unit. She was also instrumental in the destruction of the Arastols onboard the _Pacific Chrysalis_, and volunteered herself as bait. Clouzot's report was…an interesting read."

Sousuke nodded, steel-gray eyes distant, as he remembered Kaname bravely standing her ground in front of an Arastol as it reached for her. He recalled the moment he realized that he wanted her for himself, and sighed. Courtney politely ignored him.

"San Carlos, Nicaragua. This one could be a problem…the U.S. is not on good terms with the government. We'd have to drop you in Lake Nicaragua and let you swim in," Here Courtney chuckled, adding, "Might have to pull a favor from SEAL Team Four." Team Four's arena included Central and South America, and maintained a fluency in Spanish.

"It is not a problem," he said stoically. "Chidori is my priority. All else is secondary. I am prepared to go alone."

"Hold on now, Sagara," the Lt. Colonel said crossly. Sunlight peeked through the vents in the tent roof and flashed off the silver oak leaves on his lapels, which he wore regardless of his retired status. "We are _still_ part of Mithril. There is a f-cking mission!" All previous attempts to curb his foul mouth were being tossed out the window as his voice climbed in decibels. "I'm not going to toss you out on your f-cking ass! There may not be much left of the South Atlantic fleet, but _I'm_ here" he jabbed himself in the chest with a calloused thumb, "-and _you're_ here" he pointed at Sousuke, "-and there are still favors I can f-cking call in! Do you get me?" he demanded.

"Yes, sir!" Sousuke barked, in conditioned response to an overwhelming figure of authority.

"Mithril will need Miss Chidori's help to stand on it feet again. I hope she will f-cking appreciate that. However, it's a tactical advantage to us if we can remove her from Amalgam…any loss of a resource on their part is a gain for us. Now then," he said, in a less ferocious tone, "back to the list…"

* * *

The young Marine lieutenant that had driven them down from Marine Command in Miami had been cheerful and talkative; rattling on about the weather in English so heavily accented with a Midwest dialect that Sousuke was hard-pressed to understand the conversation. The man had been perfectly happy to carry the dialogue himself with no input from his passengers, so Sousuke had fallen asleep leaning against the back window pillar of the dark blue Chevy Tahoe with the Marine Corps seal on the front doors, surrounded by Lemon's silent men as they headed south on Route One to Homestead Air Reserve Base.

A short while later, as the sun was finally coming up, Sousuke stood with Michele and the five-member squad from the DGSE's mythical _Division Action_ on the wide-open tarmac of the base's east runway. The quiet competence of professionals hung about them like the early morning fog that wreathed the landing strip. These silent, unassuming men didn't look like elite special forces at first glance, but then – neither did Sousuke. Their uniforms were as mundane as woodland camouflage could be, though each man was wearing a webbed harness covered in gear –handguns of various makes (mostly Beretta M9s), clips of ammo, rappelling equipment, GPS units, and so on. Each man carried the French FAMAS G2 Commando-variant assault rifle slung over a shoulder. Sousuke could distinguish a brace of throwing knives (rather impractical, in his opinion) being worn by one man; another had a M136 AT4 rocket launcher strapped to his pack frame. Several more AT-4s were lashed together with the pile of jump gear sitting to one side; they would be handy if Arastols or light armored vehicles guarded the facility. In case of heavy tanks, multiple AT-4s directed at the vehicles' sides would be effective, but they would quickly run out of rockets using that method of attack – not to mention if a single round didn't work, they'd have to hit the same exact spot as the first strike to even begin to hope for a different result. Nothing they carried would be effective against an A.S. equipped with a Lambda Driver.

Lieutenant Colonel Courtney had indeed called in some favors, and Sousuke had found himself gazing at a U.S. Air Force MC-130 Hercules, ready and waiting for them at the end of the runway, rear lift gate open. As the Marine lieutenant in the Tahoe drove off, Sousuke and his fellows gathered their gear and headed for the rear cargo ramp, where they were met by a stern-looking loadmaster with a Master Sergeant's insignia. The Master Sergeant quickly covered the safety belts/harnesses, floatation devices, emergency kits, and emergency locator beacons, then pointed them to the troop seats and went about the rest of his pre-flight check.

They strapped in for the flight to Costa Rica, where they would be inserted into the target area via HALO jump. This meant at least two hours before the actual jump, they and the loadmaster would be pre-breathing 100 percent oxygen to remove the nitrogen from their bloodstreams. Opening the back loading ramp of the plane at high altitude would depressurize the entire compartment, giving unprepared paratroopers the bends in the same fashion as scuba divers rising too quickly to the surface after being at great depth. It also meant, he thought to himself resignedly, trying to read the information he'd brought with him through a full-face O2 mask.

Sousuke stuffed a spare jacket into the red webbing stretched over the bulkhead of the plane and leaned back, withdrawing a sheaf of papers from his pack. It contained as much information as the DGSE and the CIA had been able to compile on local activity that could possibly be related to the operation of a technologically superior outpost. They had been specifically looking for signs of transport of the supplies needed to design and fabricate some of the advanced technology utilized by Amalgam. To Sousuke, who knew what he was looking for, there were some indications that the drug commonly used to help spike the brain's gamma waves, and thereby control the Lambda Driver, TI971, was being moved in considerable quantities to the area, but it also appeared that La Fortuna was more of a shipping depot than a final destination.

He frowned. It was hard to tell what this would mean in reference to Kaname. He doubted that Amalgam would have backed Leonard's all-out effort to capture her without expecting compensation of some sort. It was a given that she was either being forced to work on research for Amalgam's use, or that she herself was being researched. His suddenly active imagination conjured up an image of Kaname strapped to an examination table like the one in Shun On, her eyes wide in terror. The paperwork crumpled noisily in his hands as he clenched them into fists.

_Control yourself. Don't let 'what might be' interfere with 'what is'_.

He tried to smooth out the papers in his lap, then gave up. He folded them in half and stuffed them back into his bag. As the MC-130's four Rolls-Royce wing-mounted turboprops roared to life, transferring vibrations through the roller tracks underfoot, he tried to wriggle back in the seat and get comfortable for the flight. The rest of the men had already stretched out as much as possible and were re-reading the information packets regarding the area, examining personal gear, or closing their eyes and giving every indication of intent to nap for the majority of the flight. Noisy as it was, he was inclined to follow their lead. Unlike trips with Mao and Weber or other members of the SRT, he had no one to talk to on this flight. Even Lemon was uncharacteristically silent. He closed his eyes as the MC-130 leapt from runway to sky, determinedly pursuing sleep as the pilot pursued altitude.

Try as he might, he couldn't quite fall asleep and stay there. As he floated between the realms of wakefulness and slumber, he pondered the fate of the girl he'd been assigned to protect over a year ago. It was impossible to say what kind of condition Kaname was in. He was certain that Leonard wouldn't allow any real harm to befall her, but that didn't mean that Leonard himself wasn't a danger. There was something about the silver-haired young man being Whispered, and in close daily proximity to Kaname, that set his teeth on edge more than any other facet of the circumstances she was in. He suddenly missed the acerbic, talkative presence of the Arbalest' A.I., spouting inappropriate jokes or, even worse, suggesting they sing. Last time, it had been Christmas carols. Really, he thought muzzily, he should have dismantled that pile of junk months ago.

As Sousuke finally succumbed to sleep, his near-permanent frown eased ever so slightly.

* * *

**A/N:** Updated 12/14 – Some minor grammatical stuff, a few corrections drawn from reviews. I apologize for hyphening "f-ck," I know it looks awful, but I don't particularly want to change the whole story to an "M" rating. However, if you can find me a kid over ten who hasn't heard that word aloud, you might be able to knock me over with a feather…or more realistically, a week-old baguette… 


	3. Chapter 3: The Core

_REFERENCE NOTES:_

_None today! On with the show!_

I SO do not own or make money off of FMP, its universe, or its characters. So, no suing, please.

* * *

**Chapter Three: The Core**

"Miss Chidori?" It was a British woman's voice, low, and laced with gentle concern.

Kaname could feel a cool, damp cloth on her forehead. She opened her eyes slowly, feeling disoriented. She had just been…somewhere odd. Odd, with a tinge of familiarity, and a lingering memory of blue-green luminescence. There was a faint sense of forgetting to do something important. She moved her limbs restlessly, feeling the slight weight of a sheet drawn over top of her.

She found herself laid out on her own massive bed, still clad in her jeans and shirt. Slowly, she sat up; catching the chilly cloth in her hand, and placing her other hand gingerly against the back of her head. It was pounding fiercely. One of the doctors from the research facility was sitting in a chair beside the bed, holding a glass of ice water with a slice of lime floating at the bottom. A large glass pitcher full of water sat on Kaname's bedside table, along with a book, a folded stethoscope, and a tray of small tea sandwiches.

"How are you feeling?" the woman asked as Kaname gratefully accepted the glass and drank.

"The back of my head hurts," she replied grumpily, prodding the tender area lightly with the tips of her fingers. For some reason, her throat felt raw and her voice was unsteady as she spoke.

"That's because you hit your head on one of the computer tables earlier today," the woman replied, smiling serenely. "You gave us all quite a fright." Kaname glanced up at her visitor, puzzled by the comment. She didn't remember hitting her head.

The chair's occupant was middle-aged, with blond hair touched gray at the temples and pulled back in a sleek French twist. Kind gray eyes examined her from behind wire-rimmed glasses. The woman was neatly dressed in a crisp white blouse and a tweed pencil skirt, over which she wore the clichéd white lab coat. A laminated ID card clipped to her left breast pocket said 'Dr. Joanne Holt' and 'LD/RAA Division' beside a small profile shot.

"What are you doing here?" Kaname blurted out, nonplussed by the woman's presence and apparent familiarity with her.

"Mr. Silver asked me to look in on you after the incident this morning." Dr. Holt retrieved the empty water glass from Kaname's limp hand and set it carefully on the nightstand beside the pitcher. "Do you…remember what upset you so much?"

"Upset me…?" Kaname repeated inanely, still feeling disoriented. She stared up at the ceiling fan through the gauzy mosquito netting draped over the bed. It turned in lazy circles, throwing a long shadow repetitively across one wall. That meant late afternoon…she turned her head to glance out the bedroom windows and noted the deep amber light pouring across her balcony like honey. Hadn't she stood out there a few hours ago, welcoming the morning? Yes…there had been a rainstorm. Now all the clouds were gone, and the sun was an orange ball dipping towards the horizon through an intensely indigo sky.

"You had a very strong reaction to seeing the core of the ARX-7," said Dr. Holt, with the halting tones of someone delivering bad news. Kaname's head whipped back around to stare at the doctor, unbound black hair swinging out behind her. Her eyes went wide, her slim shoulders began to tremble, and Dr. Holt jumped up from her chair to put a comforting arm abound her. Just as suddenly as the shaking began, it stopped, as Kaname stubbornly clamped down on the flood of anguish coming from deep in her heart.

The scene from this morning re-created itself quickly in her mind's eye – Leonard gesturing for the tarp to be removed from the mysterious hulk in the laboratory, the ghastly decapitated remains of the Arbalest's torso, her voice claiming a will of its own and screaming uncontrollably. She could now recall stumbling backwards, trying to distance herself from the object that had shown up so repetitively in her nightmares. She remembered tripping on a cable and falling backwards, her head cracking painfully against the edge of a table, and the horrified look on Leonard's face as the room suddenly darkened.

"Miss Chidori?" said Dr. Holt, grasping one of the younger girl's wrists and taking her pulse with the ease of long practice. She then placed a finger under Kaname's chin and tilted her head up, looking in each of her eyes and frowning.

"I'll be fine," Kaname said, firmly pushing Dr. Holt's hands aside and swinging her legs over the side of the bed.

Dr. Holt didn't look convinced, but stood and picked up the stethoscope and her book. "You will feel best after you have eaten and rested," she said, as she pushed the borrowed chair back to its original spot beside the bathroom door. "Your maid will be up in a little while with dinner, and a little something to help your headache. I want you to take it just before bed." She smiled kindly at Kaname again, and then took her leave, brown leather pumps clicking smartly on the hard tiles.

Kaname waited a moment, perched on the edge of the bed until she heard the main door close, cutting off the sound of the doctor's retreating footsteps. She wondered if Leonard would have made good on his threat to hurt her friends and family if she had struck her head hard enough to bleed to death. Hot, miserable tears welled up in her eyes and spilled over, melting the iron grip she'd been maintaining on her despair. She buried her face in her palms and gave in to uncontrollable sobbing, fear and shock rolling over her in crushing waves. She hunched over on the bed, gasping for breath between despairing wails, tears streaming down her face.

Eventually, she cried herself out. Still sniffling pitifully, eyelids red and puffy, she caught her reflection in the dresser mirror across from her bed. Her hair was an unruly mess, and her cheeks were blotchy from weeping. She scrubbed at the tear tracks on her face with a handful of the bed sheets, still gulping and snuffling, then stood and strode resolutely to the bathroom.

She ran a bath for herself, adding generous handfuls of bath salts and watching absently as the water foamed and swirled its way towards the rim. She sat in the tub for a long time, still staring vacantly as steam curled in little spirals off the surface of the scented water, and the pads of her fingers turned pruney. A tiny, annoyed corner of her mind shouted furiously for her to get up and _do_ something, _anything_, as long as it involved shaking loose of the apathy that had gripped her. Ignoring it, she tipped her head back in the water slowly, watching her hair billow around her as if stirred by some languid, unseen hand.

The abrupt arrival of Sabine, her maid, carrying a dinner tray and bearing her bathrobe draped over one arm, finally broke through Kaname's stupor. "Mr. Silver is waiting for you in the sitting room," the maid said, setting the laden tray on the countertop and holding out the bathrobe by the shoulders so Kaname could step out of the tub and into it.

Sabine was a petite woman in her late twenties, with coffee-colored skin and hair that marked her as a descendant of African tribesmen brought to the Caribbean as slaves. Sabine possessed a sweet disposition, but spoke rarely and frequently looked exhausted. Kaname suspected the woman was responsible for the care of a large family in addition to her duties at the villa, but hadn't been able to draw the older woman into a discussion of it. Her silent appearance in Kaname's doorway was not remarkable, but her softly spoken words had chipped a sudden hole in the younger girl's reverie.

"I do _not_ want to see him right now," Kaname scowled from the tub, folding her arms across herself protectively, as if Leonard might materialize in the doorway behind Sabine.

"He said you might say such a thing," Sabine murmured in an apologetic tone, lowering her eyes to the floor. "He said he will come to you, if you will not go to him." The angle of her head cast shadows into the deep hollows beneath her eyes, and Kaname's conscience smote her a vicious blow at the same time as the potential dual meaning in Leonard's words became apparent. She had no right to involve Sabine in the battle of wills between herself and her fellow Whispered.

Gritting her teeth, she rose dripping from the tub and took the thick terry robe from the maid, wrapping it hastily around herself, then squeezing the excess water out of her hair. Wet footprints followed her path across the tiled bedroom and stopped when she reached the knotted rug in her sitting room where Leonard waited patiently for her, perched gracefully on the arm of a sofa and dressed in his ubiquitous black. His silvery eyebrows rose in appreciation as he surveyed the dripping girl before him. Kaname's scowl deepened as she was reminded of the last time he saw her wrapped in a bathrobe, wet hair streaming down her back. This time, she didn't have the added benefit of underwear.

"Ah, beloved. I'm glad to see you have recovered," he said, getting smoothly to his feet and reaching a hand out towards her, but Kaname had suddenly jumped backwards as if burnt. Her scowl had vanished, replaced by a vague look of alarm. "What's wrong?" he asked, an expression of concern crossing his face, hand dropping reluctantly to his side. His words had echoed oddly, not in the room, but in her _head_.

Kaname opened her mouth to blast him for using his Whispered powers to communicate with her in a totally unnecessary situation – Tessa had made the dangers of repeated contact very clear – but, his puzzled reaction led her to believe that he hadn't done it on purpose. He was definitely speaking aloud as well. Was his control slipping? Was he tired, perhaps? Could this be exploited for her benefit?

"Nothing," she said shortly, sitting down on the sofa across from him and thanking Sabine politely as the maid set her dinner on the low table in front of her, then left. It seemed to be some kind of fish baked with citrus slices, served with rice and a bowl of fried sweet potatoes, green plantains, and breadfruit. Set on the side was a glass dish of nutmeg ice cream, a teapot, and a teacup resting upside down on its saucer. Under the teacup were two white tablets, and a scribbled reminder signed by Dr. Holt: _Please take these just before bed._

Kaname picked at the fish with a fork, not feeling terribly hungry. Her bout of wretched sobbing had left a sour feeling in her stomach, and she didn't want to add throwing up in the middle of the night to the list of her day's woes. Leonard watched her play with her food with another inscrutable look on his face. If Kaname had been paying attention, she might have been able to distill it into basic components: curiosity, longing, possessiveness, and frustration. Instead, she stirred the vegetables in their bowl, and then stabbed her fork into the rice repeatedly.

"Really, what did your dinner ever do to you?" Leonard asked lightly, after watching her mutilate the food for several silent minutes. Kaname's head jerked up immediately to stare at him. He'd done it again – that odd echo, the sound of his mental voice resonating at the back of her skull instead of in her ears where it belonged.

"I think…I'm too tired to eat," she said slowly, setting down her fork, trying to hide her uneasiness.

Leonard's face fell almost imperceptibly. "Very well. Your health is very important to me," he said, getting to his feet. "You should go back to bed." Kaname was still staring at him, so her reaction to the continued echo was much subtler this time: a flinch, a flickering of the lashes. She glanced back at the tray, wondering how much damage this continued steam of consciousness was causing. Funny, she still _felt_ like herself. The teacup rattled as Leonard lifted the dinner tray.

"Wait," Kaname said, and plucked the teapot, teacup, and saucer off the tray, white tablets rocking gently against the smooth china surface. "Doctor's orders," she said with the ghost of a smile, as Leonard raised an eyebrow.

"Well, goodnight," he said somewhat sulkily, and swept out of the room. He was gone so quickly that he didn't hear the teacup clatter against the saucer as Kaname's hand trembled. She moved to the main door and locked it behind him, a gesture that made her feel a little foolish. She wouldn't put it past her fellow Whispered not to be carrying the key to her room on a string about his neck. She imagined him sneaking into her room in the middle of the night, and looming creepily over her bed as she slept. She shuddered at the thought.

She picked up the tea things and carried them out to the darkened terrace, ignoring the silent Arastol in the far corner. There was a golden spill of light from the two wrought iron lanterns hanging on either side of the bedroom doors, but it barely reached halfway across the terrace, which was almost big enough to play tennis on. The sun had set sometime during her dinner, and the sky was pitch-black over the mountains behind her. Only a faint smudge of blue on the western horizon remained. She placed the teacup on the weathered wooden table and poured from the pot, wishing she'd kept the sugar bowl. She could smell herbs in the tea – chamomile, mint, and lemongrass. It was a sharp, clean smell that cut through her murky thoughts, as she moved through the darkness to the railing with the cup cradled gently in her hands. It was only slightly warm since she had taken her time poking at her meal, and she sipped at it just to have something in her stomach. Now that her dinner tray was gone, she was starting to feel slightly hungry.

The chilly, cutting wind of the morning was long gone, replaced by a soft breeze that stirred her half-dried hair feebly, and was heavily laden with the rich, warm smells of nutmeg, cinnamon, and vanilla. It reminded her of holidays in America with her family, long before her mother had died. Those were memories that she didn't need to dust off for comfort much lately…her concept of family had slowly changed over the last year to include a young man with a scarred jawline and haunted eyes, someone who had been steadfast in times of trouble in a way that her father and sister could never have managed, even if they _had_ lived in Japan.

"Oh, Sousuke," she whispered into her cup, the tea rippling as her breath moved across it. A tear rolled down her cheek and dropped onto the collar of her robe. "Come and find me," she breathed. "Come say those words. Tell me it's not a problem." A second tear slowly followed in the path of the first. She tipped her head back to look at the sky above her; an inky cloak studded with brilliant white sparks. The cloudy white banding of the galaxy arched directly overhead, glowing softly; a sight she had never had the opportunity to view in Tokyo, given the ambient light of the city.

Kaname returned to the table and picked up the two white tablets prescribed by Dr. Holt. She rolled them around in her palm for a moment, considering the way the back of her head hurt and the strange way that Leonard's voice had echoed in her mind. She returned to the railing, her teacup in one hand and the pills in her other. She could picture Sousuke's face if she were to tell him she had accepted unknown medication from these people – stoic, as usual, but those eyes would be troubled. He'd be disappointed in her. She should know better. Her decision made, she stretched her arm out in front of her and opened her hand. The little white tablets disappeared instantly into the night, vanishing down the side of the cliff. She would live with her headache. Others had survived worse.

She brought the tea things inside, rinsed her teacup and teapot out in the bathroom sink, then set them on the low table in her sitting room for the maid to find. She stood there for a moment, considering a call downstairs to the kitchens and waking the night cook. Leonard had made it clear that such behavior was acceptable - expected, even - but she couldn't bring herself to disrupt someone who surely had better things to do than make snacks for silly, temperamental-stomached girls.

Sighing, she pulled a nightgown out of her dresser and slipped it over her head, finally shedding her bathrobe and leaving it draped over the side chair that Dr. Holt had been sitting in. She was re-arranging the bed covers when she realized that there was still a plate of sandwiches on her nightstand, along with the now-tepid pitcher of water. She picked one up and sniffed it experimentally. It seemed to be all right, despite the inclusion of cream cheese with the smoked salmon. She ate ravenously, polishing off the entire plate with surprising speed, given her earlier unsettled stomach. Feeling immensely better, she pulled the mosquito netting closed around the bed and burrowed into the pillows, falling asleep almost instantly.

* * *

Kaname went from asleep to awake with a wordless shout of terror and a sudden, frantic leap out of bed. She landed in an ungainly crouch, catching her foot in the mosquito netting puddled on the floor, slipped, and went down hard on her tailbone. She moaned in pain and shock, sprawled out at her bedside, tangled up in the thin mesh draped over the canopy rails. Her breathing was rapid and shallow, the fading sensation of her nightmare still strong enough to make her tremble in fright. 

The nightmare had been different this time, in a way that had shaken her to the very center of her being. Instead of watching from a distance, she had seen the Tokyo Arm Slave battle through Sousuke's eyes. She heard snatches of thought from him, as if he had suddenly shouted in her ear. She could hear the odd reverberation of Al's internal processes, as well as the normal verbalized interfaces. She had suddenly felt the pain of 40mm bullets tearing though her head, her right arm and leg. She felt the weight of Belial's foot stomping on her chest, felt it rip off the armored chest plate. She'd felt Al's presence fade when Sousuke said goodbye in that stilted, formal way of his. She had been left behind, suspended in the empty hollowness of the Lambda Driver core. There had been a single, silent moment before it had suddenly, terrifyingly, become a gaping black void that tried to suck her in; a vast darkness where something indescribably frightening waited for her return…and then, as she was being dragged down, a hand had reached for her: a hand limned in blue-green light. It was an anchor in the dark, holding her steady as the void tugged brutally at her consciousness like a rabid dog.

"You have to hold on," said a strange boy's voice. "I have a task for you-"

It was at that moment that she found herself awake and sprawled beside the bed, quaking in fear. She wrapped her arms around herself, gasping for breath. In the deep well of her mind where Black Technology hid, something stirred restlessly. She knew on an instinctive level that something was dangerously wrong. Her hands shook as she reached up and pulled herself to her feet by way of the corner bedpost.

She skipped her entire morning ritual, racing out of her suite of rooms as she pulled a sweatshirt over her head, her hair wild and matted from being slept on while still damp. Her sneakers pounded across the Aubusson carpet runner in the hall, then thumped down the main stairs, where she leaped the last four steps and landed with knees bent, startling the guard at the front doors as she all but flew past him on her way down another corridor towards the research labs.

Yesterday in the bath she had silently sworn to herself that nothing could drag her back into the room containing the remains of the Arbalest, yet here she was – not even twelve hours later, with every intention of kicking down the door on the lab and dismantling the Arbalest with her bare hands, if she must. She threaded her way through security stations with her temper barely in check, finally arriving in front of the door she wanted after being thoroughly harassed for charging through the facility at 5 o'clock in the morning.

As she raised her hand to the scanner panel to access the room beyond, her sense of purpose suddenly left her, and a thrill of apprehension ran up her spine, standing the fine hairs on the back of her neck on end.

"Come _on_, Kaname," she hissed at her reflection. Her face frowned back at her from the small, vertical glass pane set in the door. Through the tint of the privacy film and the grid of the safety wire, she could make out one end of the Arbalest's trunk, once again shrouded in the white tarp. She willed her palm to connect with the cool metal plate, and exhaled the breath she'd been holding as the door grudgingly slid open. She moved into the darkened lab slowly. Her steps were quiet, reverent, as if entering a place of worship.

Kaname had long harbored a vague fondness for the Arbalest, which had always appeared when needed the most; plucking Sousuke and herself out of danger multiple times since its activation in Shun On. It was a terribly sad thing to see what was left of it, laid out on the floor like a carcass. Worse was the knowledge that Leonard had had other people working on it, though what exactly that entailed remained a mystery to her. She suddenly felt a surge of possessiveness towards the ARX-7, and resolved to make it her project, whatever excuses she might have to invent for Leonard. Even if he _had_ assigned her the task, she didn't think he expected her to take to it happily. He had probably intended this to be psychological reinforcement of his defeat of Sousuke, her obligation to work for Amalgam and guarantee the safety of her friends and family. It was a reminder that he possessed her. Showing too much enthusiasm for this would suggest to him that she had an agenda of her own.

She approached the draped form and carefully took hold of a flap of fabric, pausing for a long moment before yanking hard on her handful. It slithered to the floor and huddled there at the base of the headless torso like a shed skin. The remains were a little less than four meters in length, and the chest plate was missing, just like in her dream. There was still blood crusted on the headrest of the pilot's chair. A faint coppery tang hung in the air, along with the smells of gunpowder and burnt plastic.

The sense of purpose that had driven her out of bed at an ungodly hour stirred faintly in the back of her mind, then quieted again. Kaname repressed a surge of frustration – she had a task, but so far she didn't really know what it was. All she was sure of was that it involved the Arbalest and it's A.I., and the Lambda Driver. Mixed in there somewhere was Sousuke, and herself.

"I guess there's no helping it," she sighed, and pulled the long sleeves of her sweatshirt down over her hands to pad them against the jagged metal composite edges of the Arbalest's armor casing. She climbed slowly over the exposed rib structure and sat on the closed pilot restraint, peering around for a release lever. She understood the technology involved in building the A.S.s, but things like buttons and levers were left up to the individual designer's discretion. "Ah-ha," she mumbled, leaning over to reach for a handle placed high by the shoulder and neck joints. She had to pull hard before the hydraulic system heaved the chest brace open and allowed her to slide into Sousuke's seat. She was now lying on her back in the command chair, gazing up at the acoustical ceiling panels above her. She slid her arms through the embrasures and grasped the multifunction, pistol-grip style control stems, reaching a finger out for the left-hand trackball. It was stuck in its housing, possibly from dust and dirt – or from blood, she thought soberly.

She felt strangely close to Sousuke at this moment. Being encased in the cockpit was almost like being held by him, she thought wistfully. She could faintly catch the smell of his hair on the bolster.

"Sousuke," she whispered.

As she lay in the seat, she began to feel a faint vibration through the spinal power channel. The main heads-up display flickered grudgingly to life, washing the cockpit with a ghostly blue light. She supposed it must be easier on the eyes than constant full spectrum. The screen remained blank until she pressed forward against the right-hand joystick. Immediately it spat out a string of code, filling the screen and scrolling down quickly. She released the control, following the code with her eyes, a frown creasing a line between her brows. This was definitely wrong. Damage to the computer and A.I. components notwithstanding, no pilot had time to decipher this during any phase of Arm Slave operation. She was going to have to recover the A.I. and the operating system before she could make much progress with the Lambda Driver. The symbiotic circuitry made it impossible to just pry open the physical component of the Driver without damaging both systems permanently, and Kaname had a powerful gut feeling that she was going to need both Al _and_ the Lambda Driver intact.

* * *

**A/N:** Updated on 12/14 – Again, the basic grammatical fixes. I often go back and try to correct things like awkward turns of phrase, repetitive descriptions, etc. Feel free to join in. 


	4. Chapter 4: Remove An Option

_REFERENCE NOTES:_

_See Author's Notes at the bottom of the page for some technical info…for those of you of the non-military persuasion._

I SO do not own or make money off of FMP, its universe, or its characters. So, no suing, please.

* * *

**Chapter Four: Remove an Option**

The 4 lb. composite bailout bottle containing aviator's oxygen strapped to Sousuke's leg was hardly noticeable, especially compared to the way that the air temperature at 30,000 feet above sea level – a balmy 20 degrees below zero – numbed the extremities. He knew if he could turn his head to look behind (without sending himself spinning wildly in the air) that he would see the Air Force MC-130 was well away, traveling in the opposite direction at a speed of at least 300 knots. He bobbled unsteadily for a moment, rocking back and forth like a potato chip on a tabletop before settling back into a smooth and steady flight as he concentrated on his freefall technique: spine in a slight concave arch, arms and legs spaced to keep him and his bulky gear from tumbling end-over end. If he wasn't careful, and stretched his arms out too far in front of his body, he would either track backwards rapidly, or spin in the air like a top, both of which could quickly move him far away from his intended target.

It hadn't taken long for he and his fellow jumpers to reach a terminal velocity of about 130mph, though they could drop much faster if they changed their body alignments. He kept a cautious eye on his wrist altimeter. Jumping at night meant no depth perception. It would only take about two minutes to plummet from 30,000 to 2,000 feet and he had nothing else to judge distance by. He watched the pressure-sensitive device's needle rotate slowly twice around the dial as he passed through the first, then the second 10,000 feet. If for some reason the main parachute failed, he would have to rely on the Cypres AAD to react for him, and fire the reserve chute.

He worked his jaw to relieve some of the pressure in his ears, and took a moment to appreciate the incredible, velvety blackness that was the Central American night, the air warming around him as he passed into breathable atmosphere. A HALO jump had been determined as the swiftest, most surreptitious arrival method. Options of driving in via covered civilian truck or direct approach by helicopter had been quickly nixed. While Amalgam had the ability to pick up the Air Force plane, it was unlikely that their clandestine entry into enemy territory would be noticed.

Minutes later, he was on the ground and crouched on the edge of a fenced pasture near a copse of trees lining an irrigation canal. Landing had been silent and uneventful for the seven-man team thanks to experience and the small, square stealth parachutes. The tall grove of softwoods provided adequate cover as the men unclipped from the military HAPPS (High Altitude Precision Parachute System) rigs and quickly reeled in the chute fabric. Both kinds of gear would be buried in the first location where it wouldn't be easily discovered while they were traipsing about San Carlos, along with the mostly empty O2 bottles.

One of the French _Division Action_ operators finished strapping on his gear and kept an alert eye on the field and surrounding cover as the rest of them shrugged into their backpacks, adjusted body armor, and lowered their night-vision goggles. A final weapons check, and the seven men moved out, creeping cautiously and quietly down the canal bank, towards the faint lights of La Fortuna de San Carlos.

The lead pair acting as point consisted of Corporal Anthony Fortin and Sergeant Julien Dautry, both with AT-4s slung over their packs. The rear pair was Corporal Mathieu Bonnard; who carried the majority of their explosives gear, and the squad commander, Lieutenant Renard Neal. Sousuke was bracketed in the middle of the formation, between Lemon and Chief Sergeant David Royer, who carried the tactical radio and the primary medical kit. For being so heavily laden with equipment, their passage was nearly silent: they drifted through the tree line like a purposeful mist.

Sousuke kept a ready grip on his Colt M4 assault rifle, which had been bestowed upon him by the Lt. Colonel before embarking. It was an acceptable addition to his arsenal, which had been whittled down over the past months to his Glock 18 and a Steyr TMP – the former riding in a thigh holster, and the latter strapped to his gear for backup.

He still had a respectable number of weapons caches strategically located across Tokyo; multiple vehicles stocked with equipment similar to the one he and Kaname had spent the night in several months ago, waiting for the Mithril transport helicopter to extract them from a parking lot in Choufu-shi. Unfortunately, none of his contacts in Japan had the influence to ship him the highly illegal collections, making them inaccessible, and therefore currently useless.

Maybe if he and Kaname returned to Tokyo, she would consider moving someplace where he could keep an arsenal conveniently stocked nearby…another armored getaway vehicle with bulletproof windows and tires…and while he was at it, a squad of M9s on constant standby and a platoon of SRT personnel, armed to the teeth. Perhaps a tactical nuke?

A rumble brought him out of his musings and snapping back into the present situation. The semi-distant cone of the active Arenal volcano was easily visible, and lit from the interior with a sullen orange glow. As he watched, he saw evidence of pyroclastic ejections – orange sparks leaping from the rim of the cone and vanishing almost instantly against the black, looming presence of the volcano slope. He wasn't sure if he was relived or not that the ominous rumblings were coming from the mountain. The locals were still going about their business as if nothing untoward had happened. Sousuke knew from his briefing that the volcano was constantly active, and the resultant seismic activity was considered good cover for construction or weapons testing by Amalgam.

They were making good time, and had closed in quickly on the outskirts of the small city, edging their way through old produce packing plants and cramped alleyways full of precariously stacked old wooden crates, stripped-out abandoned cars, and the occasional flock of feral chickens. They reached the newer portions of the warehouse district, which wasn't saying much. His combat boot splashed through a puddle of foul-smelling liquid best left unidentified. 'Newer' didn't always mean 'better drained,' a concept he was familiar with from his travels through third-world countries. So far, they had escaped detection by the few employees and security guards working the overnight shift, and the main thoroughfare for truck on- and off-loading was several blocks away.

As they drew closer to the objective – a group of buildings ensconced behind double security fences and a civilian guard post on the main access street – Sousuke's sixth sense, that awareness particular to a soldier, began to stir uncomfortably. It was a prickling sensation on the back of his neck, one that he had learned to pay attention to long ago. He held a clenched fist up at eye level, signaling, 'freeze'. Glancing out of the corner of his goggles, he saw the _Division Action_ squad member crouched next to him also looking uneasy.

"Lax security," he murmured in English, the only language that all parties spoke fluently. They didn't speak Japanese, and this squad hadn't spent much time in the Middle East, so spoke very little Pashto, Turkish, or Farsi. In turn, Sousuke's French consisted of three phrases and five curse words.

He got an agreeing nod in reply, as the rest of the team stacked up in the cramped alleyway between two old brick-and-mortar factory buildings. Sousuke raised his NVGs for a moment to rub the aching bridge of his nose and look around at a world no longer rendered in shades of green light.

They gazed out the entryway of the alley at their objective: a fenced enclave of buildings taking up approximately ten city blocks, set back from the access street, and illuminated by the orange-white glow of high-pressure sodium lamps on twenty-foot poles, which were strung out along twin ten-foot high chain-link fences. Each fence was topped with loops of razor wire, separating the wide, paved interior courtyard from the rest of the warehouses in this part of town. A single guard booth stood at the divided entrance, with rolling chain link fences behind wooden lift gates. There was a rickety-looking golf cart parked behind the guard booth, which currently held a single (apparently asleep) man. Sousuke's briefing had specified one posted gate guard and two roving perimeter guards. It certainly didn't seem like enough security for the kind of materials and personnel that were purportedly housed inside this island of buildings, set in a sea of yellow-washed concrete.

Sousuke and Michele put their helmets close together so the sibilance of whispering wouldn't carry out of the alleyway. "Something's up," murmured Lemon, possibly the first thing he'd said all day. Sousuke nodded in agreement. This complex was too big and consisted of too many buildings to be competently patrolled by just three men. He fully expected a secondary perimeter inside the actual buildings, most likely maintained by Arastols. If Leonard Testarossa really was holding Kaname here, then the Belial model Arm Slave was definitely on hand, and probably a contingent of Codarl models as backup.

"I think I smell rain," the blonde Frenchman added, frowning at the clear night sky overhead. Sousuke arched an eyebrow in response, but said nothing, turning his head to assess their situation before they backtracked and circled the compound, looking for an entry point at the rear of the complex where they could cut their way through the fencing and quickly make it to the shadow of the buildings. Corporal Fortin and Sergeant Dautry remained at the front of the lineup, Dautry crouched low and Fortin covering him. Corporal Bonner and Lieutenant Neal were covering the back of the alley. Chief Sergeant Royer was looking up, towards the rooftops. Sousuke examined the surrounding area for any way to reach the complex over the light poles so they wouldn't be seen, while the nearby volcano belched ash into the air.

"_Merde_!" Royer croaked suddenly, his hoarse whisper echoing off the walls as he clapped a hand to his right eye and rubbed it furiously. Sousuke and Lemon were both surprised enough to turn and stare at the man, whose eye was now red and watery. Despite his distracted state, the operator pointed unerringly above his head at the top of the building.

"They're on the roof!" Sousuke hissed, realizing that movement over their heads had kicked some kind of debris into the air, and pointed the barrel of the M4 up at the line of cement coping. Lemon swung the muzzle of his rifle in a tracing arc from one end of the building to the other, tensed for action. Seconds ticked by, like drops of water from a loose faucet. Seven…eight…nine…

The back half of the central office building in the Amalgam compound suddenly exploded in a titanic roar of red- and yellow-edged plumes of thick black smoke, showering the surrounding area with chunks of concrete and shards of glass. The shockwave rumbled through the ground and fractured windows in the surrounding buildings. Subsequent detonations could be heard as something combustible was caught up in the inferno.

As if it had been some kind of signal, three huge, hooded figures leaped from the rooftops above the Special Ops team into the street in front of them, forcing them backwards into the alley and away from the fire now raging in the center of the target.

"Arastols!" Sousuke growled, as the squad's front pair of operatives targeted the unarmored joints of the miniaturized A.S.s and opened fire. It was torture to tear his eyes away from the burning building. Once again, his instincts where Kaname was concerned wanted to leap off the cliff of common sense and send him pelting into the burning compound.

"Silver will make sure she's safe," Lemon shouted over the sounds of gunfire and explosions, in an attempt to sound reassuring. The blond man was heaving one of the anti-armor AT-4s to his right shoulder as he backed up, leveling it at the first Arastol, which was standing in the entrance to the alleyway and advancing on the front team with convulsive, jerky movements as its neck and shoulder joints were being shredded with controlled, three-round bursts of 5.56mm NATO ammunition from Fortin and Dautry's FAMAS rifles.

"Fire in the hole!" he roared, as the rocket bearing the HEAT cartridge jumped out of the disposable launcher and streaked towards its target. The shaped charge hit in less than a second, ripping the Arastol in half with a blinding flash of light. Debris blasted across the road outside of the alleyway, spraying the other two Arastols with chunks of composite armor and shreds of electroactive polymer muscles.

"I hope there's not enough left to self-destruct," Sousuke shouted to Lemon as he fired on the two remaining miniaturized A.S.s, trying to provide cover as the two front men retreated leapfrog style, trading off with the rear team as the squad backed quickly in the direction they had come from.

'Hurry up and prep another!" Lemon yelled as the Arastols seemed to make up their minds to attack head-on. One leaped high over the other as they rushed down the alleyway, its overcoat billowing out behind it like ominous wings that brushed the sills of the second-story windows – a shocking feat to the five men who had never seen an M9 in action. Nevertheless, the Division Action men were consummate professionals. Royer seemed to have recovered from his earlier eyeful of dirt and quickly raised the muzzle of the AT-4 he was arming and caught the nearest Arastol mid-leap with the second rocket. His aim was a little off - the cartridge blew the head off the Arastol and rained down chunks of brick and pulverized mortar on Sousuke and Lemon, now at the rear of the retreat. The beheaded carcass fell to the cobbled alley floor with a crash, and Sousuke gave a shout of alarm as he realized that there was more than enough left of this one to carry out a self-destruct.

"Run!" he bellowed, clutching the Colt M4 rifle in front of him and pelting down the alleyway five steps behind Lemon as a faint rising whine filled the air. He could feel an ache beginning in his abdomen where he'd been shot. He ignored it, concentrated on running. Suddenly, he was grabbed by the arm and jerked off his feet when one of the operatives reached out and pulled him around a ninety-degree corner. The new alley was barely wide enough to drive a single truck through. He had a second to count noses and reassure himself that all six of the Frenchmen were there, before an explosion was channeled down the alley they'd just occupied, followed by a deadly hail of steel ball-bearing shrapnel that rattled and pinged off the old brick buildings, scattering bits of red clay across the packed dirt and rough cobbles of the alleyway.

"Incoming," called out one of the men in a surprisingly even tone, and the third Arastol skidded sideways past the corner and into view, its arm rifle raised. Bullets exploded out of the barrel in rapid succession as the robot began firing before compensating for its abrupt change in speed and inclination, and the seven men dived for the cover available in the eleven-foot-wide passageway. Sousuke, Fortin, and Dautry scrambled behind a battered green dumpster, Lemon and Royer squeezed into a doorway recess in the backside of one of the buildings, and the last two men took shelter behind the furthest cover: an old Toyota box truck sitting on four flattened tires, blocking the rest of the lane.

The Arastol advanced slowly on the truck, following the remaining visible targets. It bypassed the other squad members as it approached the vehicle, unloading round after round in the direction of the two semi-concealed men. It completely ignored the bullets pinging off its armored back as the rest of the squad tried to buy time for the two men, while Dautry was unslinging another AT-4 from its carry strap and bringing it up.

"Fire in the hole!" the man yelled, and for the third time an AT-4 round leaped out of the tube and burrowed through the reinforced chassis of the Arastol just as it bent down to fire under the frame of the old truck at the operatives. The two squad members split directions and jumped out of the way as the explosion tore through the Arastol and blasted through the thin sheet metal tailgate of the box truck, leaving a scorched hollow reminiscent of a bullet through a beer can. All that was left of the Arastol were hands and a foot.

"Is that it?" Lemon demanded; scanning the dimly lit alley. It had only been two minutes since the initial explosion. Sousuke strained his ears for sounds of approach, but all he could hear was the roar of flames and occasional explosive punctuations from the burning building.

"That's it for now. They communicate with each other, so there'll be more soon." Sousuke loaded a new clip into the M4 and chambered a round. The bolt made a satisfying sound sliding into place, and he suddenly felt strangely at peace. He was fighting again, with the feel of a pistol grip in his palm and the bitter tang of scorched metal in the air. These were familiar things to him. He had made a promise, and he was going to keep it. When all was said and done, he would let Kaname judge him for his deeds. Until she was safe, he didn't have the luxury to deliberate the morality of his actions – this time it had been Arastols, but he would have dispatched soldiers just as ruthlessly had they been standing between him and her.

"Let's go," he said brusquely. "We still haven't confirmed what's being kept in the warehouses." Lemon nodded, and the squad re-formed and headed down the alleyway, paralleling the burning complex, keeping a row of buildings between them and the open street. They hadn't gotten very far when they caught the far-off sound of what Sousuke immediately recognized as the 14.5mm head-mounted machine guns of an RK-92, unloading in quick, controlled barrages. He exchanged a wordless look with Lemon and they picked up the pace, dashing down the alley and closing the distance to the back end of the fenced complex where the buildings were closer to the street. Someone was keeping the real security forces of this place busy, and they only had a limited time to take advantage of it.

* * *

"This was a waste of time," Sousuke grunted, kicking a wooden crate aggravatedly. Lemon, who was bent over a second crate examining the RPGs that had been carefully packed into a nest of shredded cardboard, straightened in surprise and gave him a measuring look.

"We're not really doing this for your girlfriend," he said reprovingly. They were making their way through their second warehouse on the other end of the complex from the burning office building. Mysteriously, no fire detail had been sent to control the blaze. While there was no wind to spread the flames across the complex and little immediate danger to the surrounding area, it was strange that there had been no alarm from the guards, no response from the locals – not even to gather outside the fenced compound and stare. To Sousuke, this meant that their arrival was expected. Everything of real import was long gone or had never been there…including one seventeen-year-old Whispered girl.

"Let's move on," Lemon said, lowering the lid on the crate he was examining and continuing through the warehouse towards the other end.

They had found vast quantities of drugs – bales of marijuana, pallets of cocaine blocks wrapped for shipping and ready to be cut with things like baking soda or rat poison to turn a better profit for dealers. There were weapons – AK-47s, -74s, and RPKs, and crates such as the ones Lemon had been examining full of RPGs. There were several crates of conventional explosives such as dynamite, potassium chlorate, plastic explosives, and gelatine capsules. Sousuke had even come across small production parts for third generation A.S.s, hard to distinguish from the second generation series such as the Mistral A.S. developed by France, but distinctive to his experienced eye. These were likely intended for the Codarl, and the Lambda Driver-enabled Venom variant.

Any other time, he wouldn't have hesitated to take the time to destroy everything in the warehouse.

Any other time, he wouldn't be looking desperately for a sign that Kaname had been there – a forgotten hair ribbon, something with her handwriting, or maybe a piece of clothing. He wanted nothing more than to kick open doors to the remaining buildings and sheds, shouting her name like a crazy person. Common sense held him back – the moment the office building had exploded, he'd known she wasn't here. She had probably _never_ been here – Leonard would be keeping her someplace impressive and grand, something in line with his arrogance and ego. Leonard would keep her safe. Leonard had plans for her. The very nerve of the man – waiting for Kaname in her apartment and calmly saying "I love you," as if Sousuke hadn't been standing right there, pointing a gun at his head…

Sousuke realized he was grinding his teeth together, as Lemon shot him a look of alarm.

"We've got company!" came a sudden shout from the front of the building. They had been poking carefully through the seemingly abandoned complex for fifteen minutes without interruption, while the burning central building sent plumes of sooty black smoke into the air.

"How many?" Lemon called back, checking the magazine on his rifle.

"Five – seven – wait…uh, looks like we've got a dozen or more of those Arastol things, sir. They're spread out across the complex looking for something."

"How much do you want to bet they're looking for us?" muttered Lemon.

"Err…sir?" came the voice of Chief Sergeant Royer. "Two Savages, inbound from three o'clock."

Sousuke and Lemon swore simultaneous blue streaks. There must be a secondary installation hidden in the jungle further up the volcano's slope where the Arm Slaves were kept. It was the direction of the Arm Slave machine-gun fire from earlier.

"Now what, Sergeant Sagara?" Lemon demanded, glancing at Sousuke and patting the front of his gear absently as he checked the placement of spare ammo clips for the FAMAS rifle slung over his shoulder, then touching the grip of his sidearm as if reassuring himself it was handy. "Your girl isn't here, and so far there's nothing interesting for us to take back. Things are getting unfriendly fast…I think we're done here."

"Agreed," Sousuke said reluctantly. "Call for extraction…we're not equipped for an extended firefight."

Neal took the proffered tactical radio from Royer and flicked it on, the VHF of the Marine helicopters assigned to retrieve them already set. "Lodestar, this is Passport Six." He paused, waiting for a reply. After a moment, he repeated, "Lodestar, this is Passport Six, over."

The radio finally crackled in response: "Passport Six, this is Lodestar." The voice was cool, authoritative, and female.

"Lodestar, we need immediate extraction at LZ Kilo. Expect hostiles. Repeat, expect hostiles."

"Passport Six, copy that. En route to LZ Kilo with Polaris 3, 6, and 7. ETA eight mikes."

"Roger, Lodestar. Passport Six out."

Sousuke looked over the men and took a quick stock of their remaining gear. "We're going to have to try and take out the Arm Slaves first," he said. "There's no way we can outrun them." He gestured for Bonner to join them. "There's enough explosives in the crates here to destroy the Savages, if we can lure them in, and maybe take out some of the Arastols in the process. They operate independently, so I don't know how they'll react."

"How old are the explosives?" Bonner asked, intuiting his role.

Sousuke shrugged. "They won't have been sitting here for more than a week. Guerillas and terrorists tend to use weapons as soon as they come to hand, not stockpile them."

"Got it," Bonner said cheerfully, and waved for Dautry to join him. The two operatives jogged back through the warehouse to where the crates of explosives had been noted. They would use the detonators from Bonner's gear to rig an explosion that would be triggered once the Soviet-made A.S.s came within range. The rest of them just had to coax the RK-92s into the warehouse without getting killed by the army of Arastols milling about in the shadows. Fortunately, human pilots were easy to provoke. Getting the Arastols to follow would be trickier.

They took up positions by the upper windows of the warehouse and watched as the A.S.s and the throng of Arastols moved closer, surrounding the building. Sousuke knew from experience that they would show up on a RK-92's infrared sensor, but wasn't sure how advanced the Arastols' ability to detect concealed troops was. He recalled Kaname commenting on how miniaturizing the power source had been 'hard enough,' during the incident on the Pacific Chrysalis. Perhaps there wasn't room onboard for such sensitive equipment…

"Ready?" Sousuke called. The clicks of four arming switches answered him. The foremost A.S. approached the massive sliding metal doors and bent down, shoving its massive mechanical hands between the frames and tearing them out of their tracks. As the door panels crashed to the ground behind it, four men were taking careful aim at the RK-92's exposed neck servo. Simultaneous attacks using the last AT-4s would damage the connections to the visual sensors enough to give them a chance at leading it into an ambush. It was even possible they might disable the head-mount machine guns. "Fire!" he shouted, as the Savage stepped into the warehouse.

Four rockets impacted the Savage in nearly the same spot, causing the machine to reel from the impact. It wasn't nearly enough to blast through the advanced armor plating and kill the pilot, but it was enough to damage mobility and sever electrical connections to the head-mounted sensor arrays as he had planned. Sousuke felt a grim satisfaction as he watched sparks and smoke pour from the neck joint and the shattered 'eyes' of the Savage.

They moved quickly to lure the staggering Savage deeper into the warehouse, dashing across the concrete floor to draw the attention of the targeting computer's hip-mounted motion detectors. There was a horrible sound of wrenching metal from the Savage as it began to stomp after them like a monster in a stop-motion film. It seemed the head guns were indeed inoperative, as it raised its 37mm Loginov rifle and erratically tried to trace their movements with the barrel. That, and the jerky way the upper chassis swiveled on the leg base told Sousuke that the pilot was having trouble with fine motor control. He could only hope that the pilot couldn't get a lock on them as they darted between piles of crates and taurplin-covered vehicles, headed towards the rear of the building where the ambush was planned. The explosion was carefully staged to take place where the A.S.s would be somewhat hampered by the massive collection of weapons and equipment - but only if the pilots cared about the materials staying intact.

The five of them sprinted out the back of the building, trying to put as much distance between them and the site of the detonation before Bonner and Dautry would have to set it off to keep the A.S. from either reversing out of the building altogether or tearing through the back wall to come after them. They could hear the squeal of damaged rotors and the howl of the gas turbine as the pilot poured on the power to force the damaged central hydraulics system into motion. They had put about a hundred and fifty yards between them and the ambush when there was a colossal roar and the night sky was lit up like noon. Hellish yellow-green tongues of fury streaked towards the heavens and the thunderclap sound of the explosion reverberated in his ears as he was knocked to the ground by the resultant concussive blast. In spite of the high-pitched tone drilling into his brain through his eardrums, he could faintly make out a popping sound as the ammunition stores caught fire and the rounds cooked off in their cases. Next would be the cartridges for the RPGs, he thought to himself vaguely.

"Incoming!" someone yelled, and Sousuke picked his head up in time to see the left arm of the RK-92 plow into the mechanical garage in front of him with a horrific squeal of metal-on-metal.

"Looks like Bonner rigged the plastics," Lemon groaned from his right, where he lay face down on the asphalt. One hand was pressed against the deck in front of his bloody nose, the other arm covering the back of his neck. He rolled over and scrambled to his feet, bending down and dragging Fortin upright as Sousuke did the same for Neal. Royer pulled himself up slowly, then winced as he put weight on his left leg. He drew in a sharp breath as he looked down and saw blood soaking through a deep gash in his thigh, where he had been sliced open by a flying piece of metal debris. Sousuke could see the culprit lying on the ground nearby, one sharp edge coated in blood - the ragged half of a local license plate, probably from one of the jeeps stored in the warehouse.

"Give him a hand, get him up," said Neal curtly, taking charge. Fortin slung an arm around Royer and they hobbled awkwardly down the street as fast as they could move, keeping to the shadows. Sousuke, Neal, and Lemon brought up the rear; weapons pointed back the way they came and scanning the roofline for Arastols. It was a tense few minutes as they made their way through the back lot and out the holes they had cut in the chain link fences, stuffing Royer though like a sack of potatoes since he had swiftly lost all feeling in his leg.

They rejoined Bonner and Dautry on the side of a building that served as a produce distributor, judging by the smell of rotting vegetation coming from the dumpsters. They tucked Royer into the downward slope of the truck ramp and took up lookout positions, as Fortin cleaned his comrade's gash with antiseptic spray and bandaged it as best he could with their medical supplies.

Sousuke wiped his sweaty face with his sleeve, then settled the butt of his rifle against his shoulder as he scanned the street and the buildings overhead.

"Ready?" someone asked Royer, who grunted an affirmative.

"Move out," ordered Neal, and Dautry took up point with Fortin and the seven of them moved silently between buildings towards point Kilo: an office park with a central courtyard big enough for the helicopter to land.

They moved in silence for a few minutes with no sign of the second Savage or the Arastols. It was eerily quiet, except for the now-distanced sounds of the burning compound. The smell of hot concrete and metal, in conjunction with the smoke from the burning bales of marijuana, wafted through the night. Sousuke checked his timepiece – almost four hundred hours. It was still a few hours till true sunrise, but the surrounding night had gone from thick, syrupy blackness to many shades of charcoal gray, as the eastern sky began to take on the slightest suggestion of green-blue.

The peculiar calm was broken by the rising howl of a gas turbine engine being run at high speed, as the second of the two RK-92s began to gain on their location. Sousuke gritted his teeth – he had run out of patience, the whole squad was out of AT-4s, and low on bullets. He began casting his gaze about for a likely location to hunker down and condense their firepower into a defensive situation, when the low rumble of approaching helicopters cut through the night. They were early – blessedly, thankfully early. Royer had become a nearly unconscious weight, and the A.S. was nearly on top of them, pounding down the main drag without any sign of trying to conceal itself from the local population.

"There!" said Dautry, pointing off to the west and the massive volcanic cone that reared up above the city's low skyline. Barely distinguishable against the gray of the mountain were three choppers coming in fast: one fat and two slender shapes. There was a premature sigh of relief from the special ops squad as they regrouped in the loading area behind another abandoned building. The Savage chose that moment to shove its way between the old, close-set buildings to get at them, opening fire with its Loginov rifle, spraying their surroundings with 37mm bullets that hit the road and threw jagged chunks of asphalt skyward as it tried to angle its aim over the rooftops.

The tactical radio in Neal's thigh pocket suddenly burst into choppy static, then announced in a clipped female voice: "Get down, get down!"

The slim shapes had streaked ahead, and both let loose with Hellfire missiles, pummeling the Savage where it stood squeezed between two buildings, effectively trapping itself. It took six of the anti-armor missiles directly to the heart of its bulbous carapace, and exploded with a roar as its internal gas tank ignited, blowing the head apparatus straight into the air. The flying chunk of metal and sensors traced a lazy arc back towards the compound, trailing oily gray smoke in a loose spiral as Fortin and Dautry whooped in triumph.

In moments the choppers were directly overhead, the Marine CH-53K Super Stallion dropping itself quickly into the cramped back lot with its tail ramp lowered, while the two escorting AH-1Z Super Cobra gunships whirled overhead, dealing with the Arastols that had caught up with them. Bursts of 20mm fire from their turret cannons punctuated the deafening staccato beat of the CH-53K's composite blades slicing through the night air. The six of them jogged through the hurricane-like winds generated by the Super Stallion's rotor wash, Royer slung over Fortin's shoulders. Two Marines leaped out the back ramp, M-16s at the ready as the DGSE squad hauled themselves and Royer into the cargo hold.

"I thought we were picking up an XM9!" shouted one of the Marines with corporal's insignia on his sleeves, looking disappointed. It took Sousuke a second to realize that he was referring to the United State's evaluation-phase M9.

"They didn't have the color I wanted," Lemon shouted back over the howl of the wind, and the corporal rolled his eyes.

"Time to go!" hollered the other Marine, extending an arm to herd them to the troop seats lining the interior of the bird. The corporal who had asked about the XM9 suddenly gave a wordless shout of fear and grabbed his wrist, pointing behind them.

"What the hell is that?" he shrieked, causing his partner, the special ops squad, Sousuke, and Lemon to whip around, weapons raised. The Marine had good reason to be horrified, as a Venom model A.S. was in the process of readying an anti-tank dagger at the same time as it was disengaging its ECS. It was crouched on the rooftop of a nearby building, a malevolent red glare coming from it head sensors, and surrounded by pale lightning as the phased laser projection screen powered down. The resultant vision was enough to send a cold shiver down Sousuke's spine – the Super Stallion was large and slow, it didn't stand a chance of maneuvering out of the way in time.

The Venom hurled the anti-tank dagger.

Sousuke closed his eyes. _Kaname._

There was a far-off bang, then the sharp sound of screeching metal.

Sousuke's eyes flew open in time to see the oversized blade go flying ninety degrees to its original trajectory, then plunge into one of the nearby buildings. The explosive charge detonated, collapsing the roof.

"What the…?" he muttered.

A loud voice suddenly cut across the neighborhood on external speakers: "Yeeee-_haaaw_!" came the gleeful shout. "Beat _that_ shit!"

Two M9 Gernsbacks shimmered into view, one bearing a raised sniper cannon, a tendril of smoke lifting away in the pre-dawn breeze. They stood still for a split second on a nearby rooftop, the light from the burning wreckage of the Savage gleaming dully off their matte gray armor. Then they were gone, leaping from building to building towards the surprised Venom as the Super Stallion took advantage of the distraction and rose into the air, nose dipping sharply as the pilot throttled up the three turboshaft engines with a roar.

Sousuke held onto a safety strap as he gazed out the tail ramp towards the Gernsbacks. He had thought Mao and Weber dead for three months now, and seeing the two M9s leaping and dodging the Lambda Driver projections from the enemy Venom brought a tight feeling to his throat, along with a faint sense of relief. He wasn't on his own anymore, and the presence of Mithril's advanced Gernsbacks here in Costa Rica meant that the Tuatha de Danaan, too, had survived the Amalgam assault on Merida Island.

The Venom's pilot had been startled when the anti-tank dagger was shot out of the air, but had quickly recovered his bearing. The blue-white flare of the Lambda Driver's shield was clearly active, flickering into view as it deflected ammunition, and the pilot was making use of it to close in on Mao's machine, identifiable by its distinctive ECCS head array. Mao was unloading round after round in the direction of the Venom, and doing zero damage. The force field was effectively repulsing the bullets, and the Venom actually appeared bored. Kurtz made a running leap at the back of the Venom, monomolecular knife at the ready, and was knocked out of the air as casually as a man would swat at a fly.

Sousuke gripped the safety strap in apprehension, his fingernails cutting into his palm. It had been a long time since he had been reduced to the role of spectator in an A.S. battle, and he found himself wanting to shout suggestions down at the gray-plated M9s. It didn't look good, with the Venom wielding the Lambda Driver against two unequipped Gernsbacks…no matter how talented or experienced his fellow Mithril soldiers were, it didn't compare to the unnatural power provided by Black Technology.

The Venom had once again focused on Mao's M9, and Sousuke could see the pale luminescence of the Lambda Driver spike towards her like a spear made of light. It arced across the space that separated them, the Venom's hand extended aggressively towards her, fingers spread. Sousuke felt as if he were frozen in place, waiting for the inevitable, as Kurtz once again leaped at the Venom's flank and the eerie radiance spread to deflect the secondary attack –

A black M9 flew out of the darkness, monomolecular cutter drawn. The Venom's attention was focused on Mao and Kurtz, not expecting a third opponent. Clouzot's familiar Falke-model A.S. caught the Venom off guard, plunging the blade deep into its enemy's back and pivoting the grip by the pommel, slicing and grinding the internal components of the spinal power column and piercing the rear of the cockpit, killing the pilot. The Venom slumped forward, showering sparks from the breach. Sousuke exhaled explosively, feeling his knees almost sag in relief. The Falke straightened, and the three Arm Slaves turned their heads to gaze at the retreating choppers.

"We have to turn back," said Sousuke.

"_What?" _exclaimed the Marine standing right next him, a hand hovering over the control for the rear ramp.

"We have to turn back," he repeated firmly, raising his voice to be heard clearly over the thunderous noise inside the chopper. He swung around with his M4 held loosely at his side, and headed towards the front.

"You've lost your f-cking mind!" the Marine sputtered indignantly. As he stepped between the young mercenary and the cockpit, a confused look appeared on his face. He raised a hand to his helmet's earpiece. "Uh…Captain?" he said, sounding surprised. His eyes flicked to Sousuke's face. "Yes ma'am." He reached into a bulkhead compartment and handed Sousuke a spare headset. "Go ahead, kid," the Marine said, despite the fact he was only a few years older than the 'kid' he was addressing.

"I must be returned to the LZ," Sousuke declared into the helicopter's intercom system. From his position in the cargo bay, he could see the co-pilot - a tall, raw-boned First Lieutenant - turn in his seat and arch a surprised, bushy eyebrow at him.

"We barely pulled our ass out of-" the lieutenant began, but the pilot cut him off.

"The Lieutenant Colonel said _anywhere_," she said calmly, and toggled the communication console with the flick of a gray-gloved finger. "Polaris Six, Polaris Seven, this is Polaris Three. We are returning to the LZ, over."

"Polaris Three, Polaris Seven. Please repeat that!" barked one of the Super Cobras.

"Polaris Seven, you heard me. We're turning around," the captain replied, her voice taking on a hard edge.

"Roger that," the AH-1Zs responded in tandem, and the Lodestar team banked left to come about.

* * *

They spotted the Mithril SRT personnel in a jungle clearing not too far from the outskirts of La Fortuna de San Carlos, just as dawn began to turn the cloudless bowl of the sky a pale robin's-egg blue. Mao and Clouzot stood in front of their respective M9s, squinting as the rotor wash of the Marine Corps choppers whipped the surrounding vegetation into a frenzy. Mao had a lopsided smirk on her face. Clouzot looked as serious as ever. The CH-53K settled on the deck, and a fading hum permeated the clearing as the 6000shp Rolls-Royce engines spun down. The Super Cobras maintained a patrol overhead, circling warily.

"Sergeant Sagara," Clouzot began, but stopped as Mao stepped forward and thumped Sousuke awkwardly but fondly on the back.

"Dammit, Sousuke. It's been a while," she said, her eyes looking suspiciously red despite her smile.

"Sagara!" bellowed Kurtz from his perch on the shoulder of his kneeling M9. His grin looked big enough to split his face in half. "How'd you like that piece of superior sniping? Only the godlike talent of yours truly-" he paused and gulped as Mao gave him a particularly ferocious glare. "Whaaat? I saved his ass!"

"It's appreciated," came the voice of the Super Stallion's pilot, walking down the cargo ramp followed by her two very uneasy-looking enlisted crewmembers, who were gaping at the massive M9s. She pulled off her helmet, and tucked it under her arm. "You saved my crew and my bird, too."

The captain strode over to Clouzot and Mao, looking perfectly composed despite the earlier encounter with an Arm Slave wielding technology out of a sci-fi movie. She had a strong, stubborn-looking jawline and high cheekbones. Her dark eyes were calm, and her coppery brown hair was done up in a tight braid and twisted into a knot at the nape of her neck. Sousuke was strongly reminded of the late Lieutenant Eva Santos, the pilot of Gebo 9. Santos and her Mithril MH-67 Pave Mare helicopter had been blown up by one of Amalgam's operatives, just a hundred yards away from himself and Kaname, while attempting to rescue them from an onslaught of Arastols and gunmen.

"Seahawk!" Mao squealed unexpectedly and leaped on the pilot, engulfing her in a bear hug.

"Mel…Melissa?" the captain stammered, staggering under the bulk of the taller Chinese woman.

"Captain?" The corporal standing behind his pilot looked torn between prying off the strange woman in the A.S. suit, and laughing as his captain tried to bear up under the sudden weight. After a moment where it appeared that Mao was trying to squeeze the breath out of the smaller woman, she let go and the captain introduced herself.

"Captain Carin Hawk, USMC," the captain said, exchanging a firm handshake with Clouzot.

"She's the best chopper pilot in the 24th MEU. I can't count the number of times she played taxi for my Force Recon unit," Mao enthused.

"Yeah, you still owe me for that five minute wait," Captain Hawk shot back, narrowing her eyes. "I do believe I was promised a case of Guinness. Plus interest."

"He made it, didn't he?" Mao said, flapping her hand dismissively.

"You owe me a whole pub by now," Hawk retorted in a good-natured fashion, and then turned back to Clouzot in a business-like manner. "I am here on special assignment from Lieutenant Colonel Courtney. I have orders to retrieve Uruz 7 and the _Division Action_ squad, and deliver them wherever they need to go." She paused, and looked askance at Sousuke. "I was also told there would be an Arm Slave to recover."

"Unfortunately, the Lieutenant Colonel is operating on old intelligence," Clouzot replied, eyeing her as if deciding just how much information he was prepared to divulge to a member of the United States' military, her connection to a member of Mithril's Board of Directors notwithstanding.

"He did acknowledge that our intelligence-gathering efforts were somewhat hampered by the policies of the CIA, and the DGSE's unfamiliarity with the organizations involved, sir," Hawk agreed, inclining her head. "However, he _is_ acting head of Mithril's South Atlantic fleet, and has this message for you and your commander: 'This officer is on loan under the Algiz directive, and will serve as liaison between himself and any remnants of Mithril's Pacific Fleet.' That includes my bird and my crew, sir." Her dark, solemn eyes didn't waver from Clouzot's stern face.

After a few silent moments, Clouzot sighed in defeat. "Looks like we need to call the Captain," he grunted, eyeing the Super Stallion, "and make some room in the hangar."

"Oh, the tail folds," Captain Hawk said cheerfully.

* * *

**A/N:** My apologies for the long wait. A big – no, HUGE – thank-you goes out to everyone who is still reading, and I promise chapter five will be up shortly. Consider it my Christmas present to you all.

A couple of fun facts:

1. MEU: Marine Expeditionary Unit.

2. The CH-53K is not actually in service yet, and the engines might be different when it is.

3. The AH-1Z Super Cobra is the four-bladed variant of the AH-1W Super Cobra. The additional blades vastly improve the performance envelope (higher, faster). There is some debate as to whether they are equipped to fire Hellfire missiles or not; my info says yes, but my beta says no. Since I think he's going off AH-1 specs (which are not equipped to fire Hellfires, but TOWs) I am throwing caution to the winds and including them.

4. Algiz is the rune for defense, protection, a shield, and is also a rune of warding. Also spelled 'Elhaz.'

Update on 12/14 – Same tiny edits as all the other chapters.


	5. Chapter 5: Tense Intermission

_REFERENCE NOTES:_

_Ruslan and Lyudmilla is a real Russian opera!_

I SO do not own or make money off of FMP, its universe, or its characters. So, no suing, please.

* * *

**Chapter Five: Tense Intermission**

It had been a long day in the lab, and Kaname's fingers ached from being curved over a keyboard. She sighed and leaned forward, resting her chin on the pilot's brace inside the cockpit of the Arbalest's shell, exhausted. She felt as if she had been balancing on a knife's-edge precipice for the past several days, teetering between her sense of self and a gaping, black maw of nothingness. Things were happening that she couldn't explain. She would move from one task to another with no recollection of completing the first. Spans of time were missing; a few minutes here, a half-hour there. She would find herself holding completed pieces of circuitry or staring at results on a computer screen that she hadn't realized she was working on. It was disturbing, to say the least, but making a concentrated effort to remember was like trying to catch tadpoles with pliers.

She'd lost a whole day right after she had begun this project, retaining only a curious blankness. One moment she had been playing with the frayed ends of a fiber-optic bundle, wondering where to begin, and how was she was going to connect the lab's computers to the A.I. module? The next moment, she had found herself crouched on the severed neck aperture, palms pressed against the armored case of the Lambda Driver housing, her nails aching as if she'd been prying at the welded seam. The throbbing in her knees and the numb sensation in her feet told her that she had been kneeling there for a long time. She had slowly gotten to her feet, turned, and taken a startled step backwards; for it now appeared as if someone had disemboweled the Arbalest, spilling its garish mechanical innards onto the floor. Yards of colorful cables and wires streamed from multiple connections points, snaking and curling across the floor to the bank of computers that had been packed neatly away that morning. Her legs had chosen that moment to do a fairly good impression of cooked pasta, and she had collapsed on the floor, shaken and bewildered, but it hadn't stopped her from returning the next day…or the next.

She had been working for a week when Leonard stopped by.

Kaname was carefully dismantling the heads-up display in order to remove one of the damaged hard drives, when she felt as if all the hairs on the back of her neck had stood on end and shrieked at her in warning. She turned quickly to see him standing in the lab doorway, a self-satisfied look on his face.

"It looks like this work suits you," he said, waving his hand in a graceful arc to indicate the long table full of computers, the river of cables, and the partially dismantled corpse of the Arbalest.

"Not by choice," she snapped. She glared at him, pushing her bangs off her damp forehead. She'd taken off her sweater when her exertions had warmed her up enough to compensate for the chilly temperature, and the lightweight blouse she wore underneath was starting to cling to her back. Leonard held up his hands in front of him in a pacifying gesture, walking slowly around the table that separated them, his eyes fastened unerringly on her face.

She tensed as he came closer, his blue-gray gaze so like his sister Tessa's, and yet so different. Where Tessa held innocence and hope, Leonard carried contempt and arrogance. She still wasn't sure what to make of the odd double echo she was still getting from him, but had learned to conceal her discomfort as every word he said still reverberated in her mind. He stopped directly in front of her, a looming black shadow.

"You were wasting your gift in Japan, you know," he breathed, a pale hand coming up to gently brush against her cheek in a feather-light caress. She scowled, wishing she hadn't let him pin her against the side panel of the Arbalest. She was trapped between it and him; the only way out was to duck under his arm. She didn't want to anger him by flat-out rejecting him, but every time Leonard got this close she was reminded of a night on a rainy, cold rooftop, and the theft of something important to her. It took an exertion of willpower to not raise her hand to her mouth and wipe at her lips.

"I was _happy_ in Japan," she retorted, her words dropping harshly into the otherwise silent computer lab.

"Were you?" he murmured, leaning in, his mouth near enough to brush her cheek and make her shiver. "With those common people? With _him_?" She could feel waves of…something…coming off of Leonard, a something that made her squirm uncomfortably against the cold armor plating. The light sheen of sweat on her skin had turned icy.

_Yes! _shouted her heart. _I was happy. Even with all the crazy, insensible, oblivious things that Sousuke did, I still had my life. He never tried to take it away from me. He never suggested I stay home and hide under my bed. _

"He's a murderer. You saw it with your own eyes," Leonard whispered in her ear, his silver hair falling about them like a curtain. "He didn't even look back at the little boy that was wounded during the fight in Choufu-shi. He nearly ran over an innocent woman. He's reckless. Dangerous." He smiled at her with a frighteningly intense and predatory gleam in his eyes.

Kaname pressed herself against the Arbalest for support. Leonard was correct, in that Sousuke had disregarded the safety of others in his attempt to keep her out of the hands of Amalgam. However, it occurred to her that he wouldn't have had to take such drastic measures if they hadn't been pursuing her so intently. Amalgam's forces had been just as dismissive of the civilian cost.

All of a sudden, she felt as if someone had put a warm hand in hers and given it an encouraging squeeze. She exhaled the breath she'd been holding.

"It doesn't matter now, does it?" she said quietly, and Leonard jerked his head away from her as if he'd been slapped. He frowned.

"What do you mean?" he demanded.

She shrugged. "It doesn't matter, because I'll be a prisoner, a _possession,_ for the rest of my life. That's what you have made me. Even if Mithril could take me back, I'm just a thing now." Her voice began to rise, hysterically. "A thing to be used and exploited – because of stuff in my brain that I never wanted!"

"I had nothing to do with that," he said, crossly. "It could have been much worse for you, beloved. You have a better life here, where you're appreciated for your power. There are no ignorant masses of idiotic people to hold you back. You are capable of so much, Kaname!" His eyes blazed intently at her, as if he was trying to imprint his beliefs on her soul through the power of his stare.

"You aren't listening to me," she snarled. "You wouldn't listen the first time. I liked my life. You forced me into this…work!" She flung her arm out in a similar gesture to Leonard's previous wave, indicating the Arm Slave behind her. "Are you satisfied? If I finish this, will you let me go home?" Her voice trembled with anger.

Leonard sighed and stepped away, recapturing his composure and the calm, aloof expression he always wore. "I didn't really come to check up on your work," he said coolly. "There is an opera next week in St. Georges that I am going to take you to. I'm sure you would like the chance to leave the villa."

Kaname nearly lost her eyebrows in her hairline; she was so startled by the sudden change in tack. First a screaming match over his kidnapping of her from Tokyo, using Sousuke as a hostage; now opera night? This was the last thing she expected from him. Then again, maybe she should have. She was being asked on a date without the option of saying no. Regardless, he was right: she would love a chance to leave the stifling, heavily guarded compound. Maybe she could concoct a way to contact Sousuke…or Tessa, or someone! No, if Tessa lived, she was on the Tuatha de Danaan, in the Pacific…too far away to resonate with and beg for help. She eyed Leonard surreptitiously from under the screen of her bangs. Would he know if she called to his sister for help? Would he even know if Tessa were dead? Would he tell her?

"It will be nice to spend some time with you," he said softly, moving closer again. "Alone." He had brought his hand back up, this time catching up a lock of hair that spilled over her shoulder and winding it slowly, hypnotically around his fingers. Her black hair was a stark contrast against his pale skin. "Kaname," he breathed. "So mercurial." She pressed the back of her head against the ceramic-metal composition armor, hard, wishing she was strong enough to push it back and give herself more room.

"It…would be good to get out of here…" she ground out slowly, trying not to sound resentful. His very presence, his hand wound in her hair was causing her heart to thump erratically, and she was only mostly sure that it was in fear. To have her heart betray her at a time like this would be too much, and she wanted him to leave before anything else happened. "I don't have a dress, or shoes, or someone to do my hair," she said slowly, as a sketchy, desperate plan formed in her mind. Get out of the villa, go shopping, ditch the escort, disappear into the rainforest, make it to the airport, stowaway on a plane…

"You don't need to worry about such things," he replied, waving his free hand airily. He gently unwound his other hand from her hair, gazing at where she stood pressed back against the Arbalest, his eyes suddenly dark and unreadable.

"I have taken care of everything," he continued, turning to leave. "Your maid will have it brought to your room that afternoon, and someone will come for you in time to dress." His mouth twitched. "Until then, beloved…" With that, he swept out the door, his black coat whipping around the corner silently.

She slid bonelessly down the side of the ARX-7 to sit on the chilly vinyl floor, legs splayed out awkwardly, trying to regain her composure. Leonard unsettled her in many ways; he wasn't a typical, easy-to-hate villain. He had developed technology that allowed Amalgam to start civil wars and escalate conflicts. He had one of his Arastols casually kill that assassin right in front of her. He had used Sousuke as a hostage to bring her out of hiding and kidnap her from her home. But…he was Whispered, like her, and unmistakably brilliant. He understood the incredible leaps and bounds her mind could suddenly take. He was handsome, he could be kind at times, and he had made his interest in her perfectly clear. He had even told her he loved her, unlike a certain-

Kaname buried her face in her hands.

* * *

A week later, Kaname tapped one long, slim finger against the keyboard in front of her, frowning in concentration. The laptop rested precariously on her thighs, much like her own perch on top of the Arbalest's chest cavity. Her feet dangled down into the pilot's cockpit, one foot swinging back and forth rhythmically, as a frown creased her brow.

"Come on...I know you're in there!" She sighed, pinching the bridge of her nose in an attempt to ward off the headache she knew she'd have shortly. The endless lines of computer code were like a digital fortress that the remnants of the A.I. had hidden itself behind. She couldn't decide if she wanted to congratulate the creator of this convoluted mess or bounce his skull firmly and repeatedly against the ground. It had taken her a whole day just to determine that the A.I. still existed. Now, it was taking a week's worth of intermittent work to coax it out of its hiding place and reinforce it.

She closed her eyes briefly, holding tight to the edge of the armor plate, as another wave of disorientation swept over her. It was an uncomfortable sensation, as if she were suddenly standing over her own shoulder, watching her body go through the motions of moving and breathing by itself. It wasn't something she wanted to get used to, but it had begun happening last week, shortly after removing most of the armor plating from the Lambda Driver core.

Her concentration was broken by the gentle rap of knuckles on the safety glass panel in the lab door. She lifted her head and swept her heavy mane of hair off her shoulder where it had been hanging like a thick velvet curtain. There was no rill of apprehension that commonly accompanied Leonard when he came to visit, so she was willing to behave in a civil manner to whoever was interrupting her.

"You look well, Miss Kaname," said a familiar voice as the door swung open.

"Dr. Holt," Kaname said, pleasantly surprised. She had been expecting a stone-faced guard or a bland research assistant, come with another question about the new Behemoth-I she had worked on months ago.

The blonde woman was dressed as smartly as ever, her stiff white lab coat draped over a peach colored cable-knit sweater and charcoal slacks. She smiled up at Kaname's perch on the metal ribs of the ARX-7 in a friendly fashion. "It seems you've recovered from your headache and disorientation. Any lingering symptoms?"

Kaname shook her head. "Nope." She wasn't about to divulge the resonant echo from Leonard or the fact that she was experiencing sporadic memory loss and random out-of-body moments. Some unconscious part of her acknowledged these as payment for the work she was accomplishing.

"That's good to hear," said Dr. Holt, still smiling. "Mr. Silver sent me down to check on you before you left this afternoon," she continued. "He didn't want the helicopter ride to cause you any problems."

Kaname almost laughed aloud, but managed to clamp her teeth shut on it. "That was thoughtful," she said politely. Leonard was making sure she couldn't excuse herself from his company by claiming she wasn't feeling well. She closed the laptop, and unplugged it from the wire harness trailing from the central processor link.

"My, look at the time," Dr. Holt murmured as she glanced at her watch. "I have to attend a meeting in the main villa shortly. Why don't I walk up with you?"

Kaname suddenly felt indignant. She didn't need an escort, but clearly that was the function Dr. Holt was going to be performing this afternoon. She stomped hard on the irritated words that wanted to come rushing out.

"Let me get my sweater," Kaname said, ducking behind the Arbalest and scooping it up off the floor. She had to suddenly clutch at the side for support as the disorienting sensation washed over her again. This time the sense of standing beside herself was so strong, and tinged with a sudden feeling of anger, that it felt as if she might loose her breakfast.

"Kaname?" Dr. Holt said, curiously.

"Ah, ha ha ha...found it!" Kaname laughed self-consciously, and regained her composure. She stood up quickly and shook the sweater out. _Stop it!_ she shouted mentally at whatever entity was driving her crazed science experiment. _I don't need to be distracted tonight,_ she told it. _If I can take advantage of one night away...I have to _do_ something._

* * *

Sabine set a long white box wrapped with a wide black ribbon on the bed and stepped back, gesturing for Kaname to open it. The Whispered girl eyed it dubiously, thoughts of what a seventeen-year-old boy would pick out for his captive date to wear running through her mind. She envisioned all manner of horrid, ruffle-y gothic Lolita getups, lace and black leather straps, chest-baring corsets and skin-tight skirts that barely covered her backside. "I'd rather go naked!" she muttered furiously to herself, and Sabine shot her a scandalized look.

She took a deep, bracing breath and stalked over to the bed, ripping the ribbon off the box and tossing it unceremoniously to the floor. She lifted off the top of the cardboard box to reveal a nest of silvery tissue paper inside. She yanked it out impatiently, letting it flutter to the ground and join the ribbon as she dug about.

"Oh," she said blankly, as she pulled a length of beautiful bronze silk out of the box. It rippled like water in her hands, light and heavy all at once. She lifted the rest of it up and held it across her chest, forgetting for a moment under what circumstances she was going to be wearing this. "I suppose this isn't that bad."

Twenty minutes later, she had changed her mind. Her hair had been pinned up in a smooth and elegant twist, and she had finally decided that a little makeup wouldn't hurt, either. Sabine had helped her into the dress. Now, Kaname was examining herself in the mirror apprehensively. The sleeveless neckline was just below her collarbone, and the bias-cut silk jersey draped elegantly down the curve of her body to skim her toes, then swept out behind her in a short but graceful train.

It wasn't the front that was the problem, she sighed to herself. It was the back. Or lack thereof. She turned, and a vast expanse of pale gold skin showed starkly against the deep bronze of the silk. The whole of her shoulders and spine was exposed, all the way down to the small of her back where it stopped just shy of being unseemly.

It was a beautiful, elegant dress, but the feel of the early evening breeze against her exposed skin made her feel naked and vulnerable. _Is this how Sousuke would feel with no gun?_ she wondered. The dress hadn't needed a single stitch or alteration. The color of it, combined with the black of her hair and the gold of her skin, was a flattering choice. She had to give Leonard credit for his good taste. She stared at her reflection for a moment: the darkened lashes and the pale bronze shade swept carefully above her eyes, the pale tint of her lips, the slim body encased in shimmering bronze-brown silk.

She wanted to run into the bathroom and scrub her face with a towel, throw the dress in the trash, and hurl the shoes off her balcony.

"Sabine?" Kaname called, as she sat down on a side chair to slip on the matching bronze heels. Her neck prickled in warning, and she jerked her head up.

"Good evening," said Leonard softly, standing only a few feet away. His blue-gray eyes were intense with admiration and...heat. He held a flower in his hand; a single, wide bloom of ruffled, cream-colored petals dusted with gold. He moved in and tucked it into her hair with deft fingers, where its sweet scent wreathed around her head. "I had thought the dress would suit you, but…it seems my imagination has failed me."

Kaname eyed him in return, and reluctantly admitted that he cut a dashing figure in an all-black tuxedo. She wasn't at all surprised to see his bullet-deflecting coat draped over one arm. He held the other out to help her up from the chair. She tentatively placed her hand in his and managed not to stiffen up when he covered it with his own, then tucked it around his arm in grand fashion. He smiled at her again, and swept her inexorably out of her rooms and down the stairs, through the main doors of the villa and into the paved circular courtyard where an Amalgam helicopter waited, rotors thoughtfully stilled so as to not muss her hair. She was thankful that this one seemed to have no military purpose whatsoever, and was painted a glossy white with a blue-gray stripe down the side.

"Our chariot," he laughed, and helped her climb into a seat.

* * *

Some of Kaname's sense of wonderment faded when they landed on a cruise ship anchored in the azure waters of St. Georges' wide harbor. She'd had quite enough of ocean liners last Christmas, thank you; and this one certainly put her in mind of the events on the _Pacific Chrysalis_. She eyed Leonard and thought uncharitable thoughts.

It didn't take long for a suit-clad security detail to materialize on the helicopter pad and sweep them through a maze of corridors to a surprisingly empty restaurant on one of the upper levels. Kaname kept looking around for diners as she was led across rich, dark wooden floors, threading her way between white cloth-draped tables. There was little overhead light, just the soft golden glow of candle centerpieces on each table. One of the wait staff pulled out a chair for her at the only table set with shining silverware and glasses, and she sat reluctantly.

"Where is everyone?" she finally demanded, as Leonard sat down in the chair across from her. "I thought this ship was full of people."

"It is. I just reserved the whole restaurant so we wouldn't be bothered," he said nonchalantly.

Kaname found herself at a loss for words. Idly, she picked up a heavy-handled salad fork and wondered what would happen if she tried to attack him with it. Would his coat leap off the back of his chair and repel her? She tested its balance the way she had watched Sousuke test the balance of a new knife, listening with half her attention as Leonard ordered their dinner and launched into a one-sided discussion of Amalgam's experimentation with rail guns.

* * *

Kaname could hear a soft murmur in the back of her head as they strode down the halls of the ship towards the theater, a faint and distracting sound. It was not unlike a radio in a far-off room: audible, but unintelligible. She was concentrating so hard on making out the words that their entrance into the grand atrium of the ship almost knocked her off her feet with its presence. The gold of the setting sun reflected off a multitude of glass and mirrored surfaces, flashing and sparkling brilliantly as they strode across the balcony to the all-glass elevator. Multiple skylights divided the ceiling up, and as she stepped onto the thick, frosted glass floor of the elevator car, she was awarded a spectacular view of the sunset over the ocean. Shreds of violet and magenta clouds were scattered across the dome of the sky, which was shaded from yellow in the west to blue at zenith, then to purple in the east.

Suddenly, as Leonard joined her in gazing out across the water, she felt a hand settle on the exposed skin of her back. It slid slowly from her shoulder down to the curve of the small of her back, an eerily sensual and possessive touch. She stiffened, and jerked away from him as they descended four levels and the glorious sunset view slipped away. He said nothing, just gave her an innocent-looking smile and gestured for her to precede him out of the elevator and through the carved mahogany doors that led to the crowded, noisy opera hall.

She managed to not stomp down the corridor in her elegant dress and high heels, but the urge to hit something was nearly overpowering. How dare he touch her like that! It was exactly what she'd been afraid of when she had put on the dress and seen the design. She snatched a program out of an usher's hand and glared at it sightlessly for a moment, slowly realizing that she had no idea where their seats were.

"This way," Leonard said, appearing at her shoulder. Their black-suited bodyguards surrounded them in a protective circle, holding back the milling throng of the audience. She glared at him, but allowed herself to be herded towards the back of the theater, then up a dark, carpeted staircase to a second-level balcony. Then they headed back towards the stage, finally stepping down into a private box that overlooked stage left.

Kaname was so angry that she almost overlooked the men already in the box, but when one of them moved to take a glass of scotch from a waiter, he revealed a distinguished gentleman with neatly trimmed goatee, and iron-gray hair pulled back in a ponytail. In a split-second, surprise took her from furious to frozen.

Leonard took her by the elbow and steered her numb and unresisting figure around the box, introducing her to several old men that fit her mental image of 'evil executives.' She didn't quite manage to reconnect her brain with her mouth until she was turned to face a vaguely familiar-looking young man of the same age as herself and Leonard. He was tall and slender, with short, light brown hair and pale green eyes. There was a single golden hoop pierced through his right ear, and, like Leonard, he was dressed all in black. Kaname felt a sudden chill as he reached out and took her hand in his, bringing it to his lips reverently. She was caught in the yellow-green wash of the young man's gaze, and shivered uncomfortably.

"Kaname Chidori. I am so pleased to see you among us," he said with a smile that didn't reach his eyes. She could feel Leonard stiffen behind her, his hand tightening on her elbow possessively. Kaname swiftly drew several conclusions from the odd dynamic between him and her escort: that he, too, was Whispered, that he was an equal of Leonard's in Amalgam, and that he, like Leonard, wanted something from her. She plucked up her courage and gave him the most furious glare she could muster.

"And are _you_ responsible for my being here as well?" she snapped, pulling her hand out of his gasp.

Unperturbed, the green-eyed boy replied, "Not really. I simply signed off on his request to bring you in." He indicated her 'date' with an indifferent nod of his head. Then, with a thoughtful expression he added, "You would have had to come to us sooner or later. It's a wonder Teresa has lasted so long on her own."

"Tessa is a good person! She would never help you!" Kaname exclaimed, stung by the implication. The petite, silver-haired captain of the Tuatha de Danaan would in no way condone the actions of Amalgam. It was the epitome of organized crime and terrorism rolled into one! Mithril existed to stop people like them, not meekly join hands with the enemy when beaten.

The boy looked mildly amused by her outburst. "You really have no idea what you are capable of, do you?" he said quietly. He then turned his back on her and walked away, effectively dismissing them.

"Why, that little…!" she hissed under her breath, and was startled to elicit a normal-sounding chuckle from Leonard. She looked up to see his eyes dancing with laughter.

"He does rather grate on people," he said, grinning down at her and looking like a regular seventeen-year-old boy for a moment. Well, an extraordinarily good-looking one, anyway. His blue-gray gaze was considerably friendlier than the one she'd just been trapped in.

She frowned. "Who is he?" she asked, feeling rather flustered by the odd comment about her potential.

"That…is Mister Gold. The head of Amalgam."

It took a supreme effort of will, but somehow Kaname managed to not shriek '_what?_' at the top of her lungs. She settled for a gasp of disbelief, but any further discussion of one of their peers running an evil, worldwide, warmongering organization was cut short as she bumped into the older gentleman she had caught sight of earlier.

"And I believe you already know Mr. Kalinin," Leonard said smoothly, from behind her. The Russian man gave her an impassive stare, and Kaname couldn't tell if he was surprised to see her or not. She certainly hadn't expected Sousuke's Lieutenant Commander to appear in a private box full of Amalgam members. Her thoughts chased each other around in her head as she stared back, and she quickly dismissed the notion that he was here to negotiate for her release, or that they were unaware of his position in Mithril. She felt a sudden indignant fury on Sousuke's behalf – this man had been a father figure to him, whether Sousuke realized it or not, and now that Mithril was destroyed he had casually turned to the winning organization - regardless of their purpose? After her impassioned defense of Tessa, this was the straw that buried the poor camel.

"You-" Kaname stepped forward and slapped Kalinin across the face with all her considerable strength. His head jerked to the side from the force of her blow, then turned back to gaze levelly at her. He hadn't even blinked.

Leonard laughed. "An auspicious start, eh, Andrei?" Kalinin wiped a trickle of blood from the corner of his mouth, but said nothing.

The theatre chose that moment to dim the lights in anticipation of the start of the opera, and Kaname belatedly realized that the orchestra had been tuning up this entire time, a dissonant musical backdrop to her incensed eruption. "Over here," Leonard said, drawing her away from the expressionless Russian to their seats at the far side of the box. She let him lead her, not watching where she was headed as she glowered at Kalinin, who silently watched her go.

The opera began with a grand flourish of sound and the raising of heavy red velvet curtains on the stage, revealing the first act. She smoothed the crumpled program on her thigh and read the title of the opera: "Ruslan and Lyudmila. An 1842 Russian epic." She sighed. They would be singing in Russian? How would she ever understand what was going on? The brief synopses of each of the five acts were vague at best. She settled in her seat and accepted a pair of brass opera glasses from Leonard, placing them in her lap atop the wrinkled program.

The first scene was a feast of some sort, and a man was singing with much gesturing at a woman and a knight sitting beside what was apparently the king. He carried on for a while, then the woman stood up and made consolatory gestures towards two depressed-looking men at the other end of the table. She then returned to the king, who joined her hands with the knight's.

"The bard Bayan was prophesying struggles ahead for Ruslan, the knight, and the king's daughter, Lyudmila, before they are finally happy," Leonard murmured in her ear. "Lyudmila then cheers up the two suitors who did not win her hand. Now the king is blessing their engagement."

Kaname gave him a grudgingly impressed look. "You speak Russian, too?" she whispered.

He smiled. "No, but I knew you didn't either. I read up on the story." He continued to explain the opera to her as it progressed. In a crash of thunder and sudden darkness onstage, the evil dwarf sorcerer Chernomor kidnaps Lyudmila. Ruslan, along with the two rejected suitors, vows to find her. The king promises half his kingdom and the hand of his daughter to whomever returns her.

While in search of Lyudmila, Ruslan encounters a good sorcerer who promises to help, and directs the knight into the desert where he must slay a giant talking head. He does so, and as the head dies, it explains that it was a giant once, the brother of Chernomor, and was tricked into concealing a sword that was fated to kill them both. Before Ruslan cuts the head open to take the sword, the giant head asks that the knight avenge him.

As the curtains dropped on the end of scene, the house lights came up and the audience began moving about, standing up and stretching or chatting quietly with each other. Women headed in droves to the back of the theatre. Kaname realized that she had been sitting still for a good hour, maybe more. As she set her program and opera glasses in a neighboring seat, Leonard caught at her hand.

"Where are you going?" he demanded in a low, taut voice.

"That is _not_ something you ask a lady!" she replied indignantly, out of habit. At the puzzled look on his face, she elaborated, "The ladies' room, of course! Honestly, why is it always like this…?" He let go of her hand, looking shamefaced, and a pair of suit-clad guards fell in behind her as she made her way to the back of the auditorium. According to her program, she had twenty minutes before the next act began. She wasn't so much worried about missing the opera, which seemed overly complex and disjointed, as if written by many people at once. No, she was more concerned about Leonard and that box full of creeps not questioning what she was up to.

The upstairs ladies' room was remarkably empty. There were no women crowded around the mirror, powdering their noses or fumbling in tiny purses, something she was grateful for. She wet a napkin and dabbed her forehead and neck, then closed her eyes for a moment. What was she going to do? After a quick investigation, she had discovered no second way out of the bathroom, no ceiling panels or trapdoors or convenient secret elevators to escape by. She would have to go back out the way she came, where the two guards were waiting. She didn't think she could outrun them, not in heels, and not through a milling crowd of people. Even if she could, she would still have to make it to the ship's railing and jump overboard to swim to shore. How would she avoid the local police if she were staggering up the street in a sopping wet evening gown? Her very appearance would scream 'suspicious,' not to mention that Amalgam probably owned the police force. She sighed, feeling resigned to her fate for the moment.

She was returned to the box, which was currently empty of all Amalgam opera-goers, and the guards moved off down the hall to stand at the staircase. She moved to the balcony and gazed down at the curtain-covered stage and the half-empty orchestra pit. There were sheets of music and empty water bottles scattered everywhere under the musicians' feet, white shapes against the deep burgundy of the carpeted floor.

A throat was cleared at her back, and she turned. Kalinin stood behind her, looking stern.

Kaname gritted her teeth as feelings of anger and indignation roared to life at the sight of him. "So this is how you save yourself? You sell out your friends to the enemy?" she snapped.

The faintest, fleetest of amused smiles crossed his face. "You remind me of my wife," he said in an oddly gentle tone.

"Well, I hope she hit you harder than I did!" she retorted stiffly.

"She probably would have," he agreed, "if she were still alive."

Stymied, Kaname glanced away, down into the main theatre seating. She spotted Leonard, talking with that…boy, Mr. Gold. She backed away from the railing, so they wouldn't look up and catch sight of her. As angry as she was, she could feel understanding for Kalinin's loss working its way into her heart. "I'm sorry," she grumbled under her breath, but it seemed that Kalinin had heard her anyways, because he inclined his head in acceptance.

"It was many years ago." He took a cautious step closer, as if he suspected another slap was in the works. "I will admit to great curiosity as to how you came to be here," he added, and his voice rang true with a tone of undisguised interest.

"I wasn't given a choice. Your friends destroyed half of Tokyo to get to me."

"Friends…?" Kalinin rumbled, a silver eyebrow arched in puzzlement.

"You know…Leonard, Mr. Gold, and all their little henchmen in trenchcoats. Chased us with guns and Arastols, held my school hostage with bombs, destroyed downtown like a Godzilla movie." She threw an angry glance over the railing and crossed her arms in front of her. "Sousuke did everything he could to protect me, but they got him in the end, too. Leonard was going to kill him. There was nothing else I could do, so…I went with Leonard…" she trailed off, looking miserable.

"And the purpose of this…pursuit?" he prodded.

"Black Technology, of course," she said softly. "I'm just a thing, a container. My life doesn't matter to them. They want what's in my head. First I worked on their new Behemoth. Now they've brought me what's left of the Arbalest…" she glanced up at Kalinin, managing to catch a flicker of surprise and concern in his eyes, and her mind suddenly suggested that a deeper game was being played by the former KGB agent. "Why are you asking me about this? Shouldn't you already know?" Her eyes narrowed. "Are you really working for Amalgam?"

"You are jumping to conclusions," Kalinin said firmly, his hand twitching as if he wanted to reach up and cover her mouth.

"I have nothing to loose," Kaname replied, her voice quietly intense, carrying over the hushed murmur of the audience returning to their seats in the auditorium. The frigid feeling of helplessness that had been dogging her for months was melting away slowly as hope began to warm her. "I trust Sousuke, and he trusts you," she whispered, moving towards him.

"You should not trust _anyone_," the Russian replied quellingly, his craggy face dark and disapproving. "The Sergeant should have taught you that!" He grabbed her shoulder and dug in his fingers, opening his mouth to further admonish her, when Kaname suddenly felt the all-too-familiar wave of disorientation wash over her. She was wrenched from her body and forced to watch from a distance as her head tipped back, eyes blank and sightless, and her mouth opened.

"**_The weapon you seek is being forged. Be ready in four nights, in the name of Weyland!_"** Her voice sounded as if it came from the bottom of a well, hollow and echoing. Kalinin let go of her shoulder as if her skin had scorched him. Suddenly snapped back into her body again, she clapped her hands over her mouth, eyes wide with surprise. She could feel her legs trembling beneath her, as if all her energy had been drained away by the singular act of speaking. She leaned heavily against the balcony railing behind her for support as Kalinin, looking positively stricken, glanced around hurriedly to see if anyone else had overheard. There was no one in the neighboring boxes, nor had the other Amalgam members made it up the stairs yet. Kaname leaned backwards over the railing and peered down into the auditorium, where she could see Leonard and Mr. Gold still standing in the same spot, now holding brandy glasses. She turned back, opening her mouth to try and explain herself to Kalinin, only to find herself alone in the box, and no glimpse of him anywhere; not even of a silvered ponytail vanishing around a corner.

* * *

The rest of the opera passed uneventfully, with Leonard considerately explaining the remainder of the story to her. Kalinin eventually returned with one of the Amalgam executives, and spent the rest of the night studiously ignoring her. She wasn't sure what to make of her unnatural outburst, but Leonard was hardly one to confide in, and the other Whispered, Mr. Gold, gave her the complete creeps; discussing it with him was right out. She resolved to pretend that nothing had happened, and trust in Kalinin and his odd reactions to her that he was playing a deeper game than what showed on the surface. When the opera ended, Leonard asked if she wanted to go backstage and meet the performers, but she truthfully pleaded exhaustion and asked him to take her back to the villa.

He handed her out of the chopper like a gentleman when it touched down in the villa's courtyard, and for once she was thankful for his assistance, as she still felt tired and drained. He was walking her up the wide stairs when she clumsily set her foot wrong in its high-heeled shoe, missing the nosing of the stair, and painfully collapsed on one knee. She heard a hem rip somewhere, and through the stabbing agony in her ankle and bruised shin, she thanked whatever wisp of luck left to her that the stumble hadn't yanked open a shoulder tie. She reached out for the banister to pull herself to her feet when a gentle hand on her arm stopped her. Without a word, Leonard knelt down beside her and swept her up in his arms, striding quickly up the rest of the stairs and down the hall to her rooms, where her maid, Sabine, waited silently in the doorway, holding it open so he could set Kaname down on her bed.

"Do you need a doctor?" he asked, deftly removing her shoes before she could sit up and do it herself.

"No," said Kaname ruefully, "it's only twisted, at worst. It's happened before. I just have to rest it." She gazed at her ankle, feeling somewhat disgusted with herself. She peeked up at Leonard through her lashes, but he too was looking at her ankle, an expression of mild concern on his patrician features. He was taking this quite calmly, she thought to herself. The first time she had really twisted her ankle, hurrying home from the train station, Sousuke had been convinced a sniper was trying to cripple her. He had thrown her over his shoulder like a sack of rice, and then preceded to dash headlong through every thorny bush he could possibly find on the long, circuitous route to a first aid clinic, catching her hair and clothes on the prickly underbrush in the process. When he finally brought her home, and set her down on her doorstep scratched and furious, she'd nearly knocked him off her third-floor hall balcony with a well-placed right hook.

In comparison, Leonard's response was considerate, caring, and_ normal_…

She tried to remember if she'd thanked Sousuke for his trouble that night.

"Very well," Leonard said, with a tone of reluctance, his disappointment visibly writ on his face. Clearly, the night had not gone quite the way he'd intended. She did feel a little grateful to him for his attempts to be kind – he had given her time out of the villa, he translated the whole opera for her, and he had carried her to her room. It made an odd contrast to the unwelcome sensation of him caressing her bare back in the elevator, or his aggressive behavior last week in the lab when he had invaded her personal space.

She warred with herself for a moment, and her understanding side won out. She gave him a wan half-smile. "Thank you," she said, gazing up at him. He looked unnerved for a moment, and then smiled back.

"For you, beloved…anything." Before she could move, he grabbed up her hand and kissed the back of it, then bid her goodnight, sweeping grandly out of her room with his coat billowing behind him. Sabine brought her a nightshirt, laying it out on the bed and turning out all the lights except the bedside lamp before she left, leaving Kaname alone in her suite.

She laid in bed for a moment, staring up at the ceiling fan revolving slowly above her head. After a while, she swung her legs over the edge and carefully lowered herself to rest her good foot on the floor, then gingerly tested the other one to see if it could bear weight. She found it to be uncomfortable, but useable. She picked up the nightshirt and limped slowly to the bathroom, where she untied the evening gown from her shoulders and let it slide down her legs to puddle on the floor. She stepped out of it, balancing on her good leg. She washed her face and pulled her long hair out of its elaborate twist, brushing it until it hung straight and smooth down her back. She pulled the nightshirt over her head and stared at herself in the mirror for a long moment, wondering what it all meant – the presence of Mr. Gold and Kalinin at the opera, the strange voice hijacking her body, the work on the Arbalest that seemed to move forward while her mind blanked. What was going on?

She was shuffling back towards her bed when the disorientation came again, only this time, she remained in her body. She gripped the bedpost for support as the floor tilted crazily under her and her stomach protested its rough treatment. When she could raise her head again, she was startled to see that she was no longer alone in her bedroom.

Standing in front of her, and limned with an ethereal blue-green light, was a familiar-looking girl about her age, with long, unruly red hair pulled back in a ponytail. Standing beside her was a boy the same age, a little taller. He looked exactly like the menacingly cold Whispered boy she'd just met that night, except that his hair was darker and his eyes were a deep, warm green. He had a kind and somewhat apologetic smile on his face.

"You!" Kaname gasped, staggering backwards a step from him. She cast wildly around for something to use as a weapon, but all she could reach was one of her bronze-colored high-heeled shoes.

"You haven't explained things to her yet?" the girl said incredulously, turning to the boy with her hands on her hips. Kaname's hand wavered over the shoe.

"Yes…and no. I'm afraid there wasn't time to do it properly," he said sheepishly, placing a hand on the back of his head in a gesture of discomfort. "And there was a lot of work to be done…"

"Well after that little stunt this evening, you had best start talking before she blocks us out again," the girl said crossly, sticking her chin out. "It was hard enough for me to reach her last time."

"Are you sure you don't bear a grudge?" the young man asked, going from sheepish to concerned. He placed his hands gently on the girl's shoulders. "There is too much at stake…"

She brushed his hands away irritably. "I told you, it's OK. He loved her more, that's all. I'm fine with it. I'm dead, remember? I've let go." She turned to smile at Kaname, moving closer. "It's good to see you again."

"What are you talking about? Why do I remember you?" Her eyes flicked from one hauntingly familiar face to the other. She could feel a scream building up in her throat as her mind tried to wrap itself around the improbable, the impossible.

Then, the girl reached out and touched Kaname's shoulder gently with a weightless hand. A prickly, electric feeling, like the sensation just before a lightning strike, danced across her skin. "I'm Nami. I've spoken to you once before, just after I died. Remember? I told you that Sousuke was still looking for you…and that I couldn't replace you in his heart." Nami gave her a small, sad smile.

"Oh," Kaname replied, weakly. She could now remember, vaguely, the conversation that Nami spoke of. Clearest was the memory of waking up and wishing, for just a moment, that Sousuke would give up and find someone else, and not put himself in danger anymore. Her heart clenched painfully.

"And this," Nami continued, pulling on the boy's intangible arm to bring him closer, "is the source of your troubles. He's the one who's been working on the Arbalest through you." The boy gave her an ashamed look, before sticking his hand out awkwardly with the intent to shake hers. Kaname stared at the proffered hand with an undisguised expression of consternation, as if it might turn into a snake and bite her. Her dropped it to his side disappointedly.

"I really am sorry about all this, Kaname. But I need your help – there are things going on that you need to know about, and after this evening – _oof!_" he grunted, as Nami elbowed him sharply. "I can't keep working the same way. It's too slow."

"You better tell me more than that," Kaname retorted, her irritation rising. She was thoroughly unnerved by the two luminescent beings chatting in the middle of her bedroom about something obscure and convoluted that may or may not involve her. "What is going on? And who are you people?" She glared at the boy. "Didn't I meet you tonight?"

The boy and the girl exchanged worried glances. "In a way, I suppose…" said the boy softly, looking at his feet. He took a deep breath, and launched into an explanation, his words tumbling over each other. "Uh…I've been borrowing your body to work on the Arbalest when I can break through your concentration, which really wasn't possible until you almost bashed your head open last week. You've been ignoring the Whispered power for so long that you've become incredibly resistant to it, and to me being able to reach you. You did enough damage with that table that your mind was laid open, and I took advantage of the only chance I could get. For that, I'm sorry." Kaname felt her glare soften as he gazed at her with contrite eyes. "I've only been able to talk to you in dreams, and I've explained everything several times now, but you never remember when you wake up." He ended with a note of frustration in his voice. "I had to find another way to fix the Lambda Driver's link to the A.I. before Al dies, so I just…took control. I'm sorry, but I had to do it, Kaname. You could fix him on your own, I think, but time is slipping away. That's why Nami and I are here tonight."

"You're here to help me with the Arbalest?" she repeated, feeling stupid.

"Yes. We have a lot of things to show you," said the boy who looked like Mr. Gold. He reached out to her and placed his hand on her other shoulder, the prickling sensation increasing. Nami's phantom hand flexed where it rested, the very ghost of an encouraging squeeze.

"Ready?" she asked, a calm look in her unearthly blue eyes.

"Ready," said the boy, his face pale in the radiant blue-green light.

"Wait," Kaname protested weakly. "What's your name?"

He smiled at her, his green eyes dark with bitter loss. "I was Bani Morauta."

* * *


	6. Chapter 6: Reunion

I SO do not own or make money off of FMP, its universe, or its characters. So, no suing, please.

* * *

**Chapter Six: Reunion**

The moment Sousuke's boot touched the gently rolling deck of the Tuatha de Danaan, he felt a wave of relief wash over him. It felt like a homecoming, though after so many years of moving around as a mercenary, he really didn't have the words to define the feeling of comfort and belonging that settled around him. He hadn't realized how much he had missed the submarine till a few minutes ago, when it had come into view through the tiny window in the side of the chopper, and he'd actually felt a tiny smile trying to crack its way onto his face.

They had circled for a few minutes, waiting for the Mithril MH-67 Pave Mares to touch down with their M9 cargos, drop the M9 pilots on the deck, and be lowered into the belly of the ship through the massive elevator hatches. This process gave Captain Testarossa the chance to prepare an official welcome, not just for the successful Uruz team, but also to greet her long-missing SRT member and the newly appointed liaison between her struggling, decimated squadron and the South Atlantic fleet's acting commander.

The attack submarine had surfaced near the coast of Panama's most southern peninsula, a generally uninhabited portion of the country used for cattle grazing. The green, rocky coastline could be seen on the horizon, fading into rolling, forested hills. The weather promised to stay clear for the time being, but May was the beginning of Panama's rainy season and, despite sunny noon skies overhead, there was a darkly smudged promise of rain to the east.

Sousuke stood awkwardly behind Clouzot, Mao, and Weber as the French DGSE squad helped the de Danaan's medical team roll the unconscious Chief Sergeant Royer out of the Super Stallion's cargo hold on a pop-up gurney and across the deck to the crew elevator. Following them down the ramp were the pilot and co-pilot of the Marine chopper, then the two-member enlisted crew. They fell into a neat line and came to attention as the pilot, Captain Hawk, snapped a crisp salute as the submarine's diminutive, silver-haired captain approached.

"Ma'am! Polaris Three has arrived under the Algiz directive by order of Lieutenant Colonel Courtney, ma'am!" she barked, gazing directly ahead…and well over the brim of Tessa's 'TDD-1'-emblazoned cover. The young girl smiled and returned the salute.

In her soft, sweet voice, she responded: "Welcome to the Tuatha de Danaan, Captain Hawk. I have heard good things about you from the Lieutenant Colonel. Please have your men fall out and follow Commander Mardukas here," she indicated the tall, lean man who was standing just behind and to the left of her and favoring her with an unhappy expression, "…to your de-briefing. Following that you will be assigned temporary quarters."

"Thank you, ma'am," replied the pilot, and following Tessa's lead, dropped her salute and about-faced to address the three men behind her. "Fall out!" They strode away, following the stiff figure of Mardukas, who kept glancing back at his captain with a somewhat worried look on his face, occasionally flicking a look towards Sousuke that spoke wordlessly of torpedo hatches and silent, watery death.

Tessa watched them go, perfunctorily bringing up the tail end of her braid to flick back and forth across her lips. When the recessed doors of the elevator in the conning tower had closed, she turned back to survey her reconstituted SRT team with a thoughtful expression. Sousuke couldn't help but feel a spark of pride while regarding the young woman he had come to regard as a dear friend. She stood solidly on the deck of the surfaced submarine, gracefully bearing the weight of responsibility and hardship on her slender shoulders. Her dark khaki uniform was neat and pressed, her face was composed, and no one would ever guess this otherwise fragile-looking girl had led her squadron out of hell a few short months ago.

"Uruz-1, Uruz-2, Uruz-6…good work. I commend you on the multiple successes of your mission. And…" she turned to look directly at Sousuke. "Uruz-7…er, Mister Sagara…I'm…" Her soft gray eyes welled up suddenly with tears. "I'm so glad to see you…returned to us," she gasped, then burst into sobs and flung herself at him. "I thought you were dead!" she howled into his jacket, as he stood stiffly in her embrace. After a long, awkward moment he managed to extract one of his arms from her death grip and pat her shoulder gingerly.

Mao swooped in to rescue him. "There, there, Tessa; see? He's fine. I told you he would be," she chided, putting a comforting arm around her Captain's shoulders and gently prying her off an increasingly uncomfortable-looking Sousuke. He glanced down at the damp spot on his borrowed Marine uniform, as Tessa pulled herself together and rubbed her face with the braid-stiffened cuff of her jacket sleeve. She gave him a watery smile.

"We have a lot to talk about, Mr. Sagara."

* * *

There were many people crowded into the sub's primary briefing room later that afternoon, but with the excitement of Sousuke returned and the new faces representing the Atlantic Fleet, who could complain? The remaining members of the Uruz team were present – Clouzot, Mao, Sandarapta, Weber, Yan, and Mandela – and were lounging casually in the college-class style seating, most with a leg hooked over the woefully inadequate protrusion that suggested 'writing surface.' Captain Hawk and her co-pilot, First Lieutenant Sexton, were also present. Sexton kept shifting around uncomfortably, his tall, lanky frame not quite fitting into the chair-desk combo. Commander Mardukas and Lieutenant Lemming stood behind Captain Testarossa as she carefully shuffled papers on the table in front of her.

"Where is Kalinin?" Sousuke asked Weber in a low whisper, but all he got in response was a grim expression on the face of the blond sniper and a quick, negative shake of the head. He didn't have a chance to pursue the matter further as Commander Mardukas chose that moment to clear his throat and flick the remote for the large LCD screen behind him. To Sousuke's mild surprise, it showed not a map of the local terrain, but a blueprint view of the Tuatha de Danaan.

"Let's make this quick," said Mardukas in his gravelly British accent. "During the Merida Island attack, supply load-in was sacrificed in favor of personnel and time. When we left the dock, human provisions stood at 20 fulfillment, ammunition at 43, equipment materiel at 32, and mechanicals at 60. We did, however, manage to completely replace the palladium pellet in the fusion reactor, and the de Danaan should be able to operate at full power for another six months. We managed a follow-up supply stop at a previously unknown-of location, possibly the work of Commander Kalinin. Nevertheless…" he paused, and pushed his glasses up the bridge of his nose with one long, bony finger. "Nevertheless, after that, supplying the attack submarine with power becomes a problem. One of Mithril's subsidiary companies was manufacturing the reactor fuel and has now been cut loose without directives from Operations Headquarters in Australia since the bombing of the Argyros building in January. That is issue one." He glanced over at his captain, who was staring blankly at the paperwork in front of her, chewing absently on the end of her braid.

"Issue two has to do with the materiel available for the M9s. We are perilously low on ammunition of all kinds due to operations conducted in the hopes of rooting out the Amalgam menace." He paused to smile wryly. "Actually, to say perilously low is misleading. We are out of bullets, gentlemen…and ladies. There are a few Javelin rockets left, and a pallet of anti-tank daggers. That is it."

To his left, Sousuke could see Captain Hawk jotting notes on a small pad. As she returned her attention to Mardukas, Lieutenant Sexton caught his eye and raised a large, bushy eyebrow infinitesimally. Really, the man could direct an aircraft carrier deck with those things.

"Ammunition is only part of it. We are nearly out of elastomeric muscle bundles, silicone lubricants, armor panels, and so on. From this point forward, any damage to the M9s is irreparable. Bear that in mind, people. Getting shot up is no longer permitted." There was a ripple of quiet, sardonic chuckles across the room from the SRT team.

Turning his head, the Commander prompted Tessa. "Captain?" She still looked lost to her own thoughts, but upon hearing her title, she pushed her chair back and rose to her feet. Her eyes were no longer vacant – they now held an expression of determination.

"We have a mission: to destroy Amalgam. They orchestrate conflicts, they escalate disagreements into wars that kill and displace innocent people by the thousands. They support terrorists, drug dealers, organized crime, anything that supplies them with money and influence. We do not know what their ultimate goal is, nor may we ever. We do know, however, that they want us out of the way." She clenched her small, pale hands into fists and raised them up chest high, her expression impassioned and resolute. "We will not be swept out of the way! We will not hide! We will strike back and cut the head from the snake, and to do so will take great sacrifice on everyone's part. We may not have the support we have come to rely on in the past, but I am confident that we can make do with what we have left. We are creative, adaptable, and resourceful!" Tessa appeared to be really working up a head of steam, and was practically panting with the effort.

The wind was taken swiftly out of her sails when Captain Hawk raised a hand.

"Captain Testarossa?"

"Hmm? Oh, Captain Hawk…yes?"

"Ma'am, Lieutenant Colonel Courtney may be able to offer some of the supplies that you need…provided you don't mind revealing yourself to the United States Navy."

Tessa exchanged apprehensive glances with Commander Mardukas, then replied cautiously, "You'll have to elaborate…as I am sure you are aware, Mithril's primary function was…_is_ the quiet resolution of international affairs. Revealing our presence to that many people is undesirable, even at this point. Just what do you have in mind, captain?"

Captain Hawk stood up and clasped her hands behind her back. "Ma'am, I have been briefed by Lieutenant Colonel Courtney on the U.S.'s OpEval-status XM9. He said the blueprints and technology came from Mithril's Research Division…so any parts that would work on the XM9 should be interchangeable with your M9s, correct?"

Tessa stood motionless for a moment. "You are correct, Captain." Her voice was low.

"Then we could have parts for the XM9s transported by plane to the nearest Navy aircraft carrier, and then crane it over to the submarine along with food and ammunition," she finished, smiling encouragingly at the tiny submarine captain in front of her, who now had a painfully hopeful look blossoming on her face. She shot Mardukas a look that said, _we must._

Mardukas pressed his fingertips to his forehead as if in pain, then grated out, "Captain Hawk, I certainly hope that you are correct about Lieutenant Colonel Courtney's ability to procure those supplies, because that would solve many of our problems nicely."

Sousuke could practically _feel_ Kurtz grinning in the next seat over. "So do I, or things are going to get real interesting in the mess hall," the sniper hissed in a stage whisper.

Tessa's mouth curved in a tiny smile. "When we finish here, Commander Mardukas will take you down to the hanger where you will meet Master Sergeant Sax, the loadmaster. He will give you a list to requisition from Courtenay."

"Aye, aye, ma'am." Hawk sat down and made a note on her pad.

"Lieutenant Commander Clouzot, would you please review our sortie tasking over the last four months to bring Sergeant Sagara and Algiz-1 and 2 up to speed?" Tessa gestured to the SRT's commanding officer and then returned to her seat.

"Of course, Captain." The tall, dark-skinned Canadian rose from his seat and walked to the front of the room, where he took the remote from Mardukas and brought up digital video clips on the screen. "We began in San Francisco," he said, pointing in the upper left corner and moving out of the way so all could view the screen. "With all due credit to the Captain's excellent acting ability," he nodded in Tessa's direction and she blushed prettily, "we managed to locate an outpost boasting a single Arm Slave, Venom model, equipped with a Lambda Driver."

Sousuke could feel an expression of surprise working its way onto his face, and fought it down. Curiously, as Clouzot continued his description of the coordinated effort between the non-Lambda Driver equipped M9s to destroy the enemy unit, and the successful results they produced, he felt relief and worry at war in his mind. Relief, that there was a way to defeat the Lambda Driver now that Mithril's only so equipped Arm Slave was nothing more than expensive scrap metal, and worry, that their new confidence would get them killed if they encountered Leonard's Belial. He was certain there was nothing capable of withstanding such complete mastery of the Lambda Driver, even though Leonard lacked Sousuke's – or Mao's, or Clouzot's – years of experience as an Arm Slave pilot.

Clouzot went on to describe some of the follow-up actions; running the gamut from raiding Amalgam lab facilities and interrogating the scientists, to acts of near-piracy on the high seas as the sub went after cargo ships delivering the mind-enhancing drug that Amalgam used on its pilots to help control the Lambda Driver. Tracing the cargo ship routes had led them to the San Carlos installation in Costa Rica, and their objectives of destroying the facility along with any supporting Arm Slaves, then following the outbound shipping routes in the hopes of finding additional Amalgam bases. There was an undercurrent of urgency seeming to come from the tiny captain, and Sousuke could look around and tell that everyone here felt it, even Captain Hawk and Lieutenant Sexton, who shared grim expressions as they listened to Clouzot's dialogue. It felt like time was running out.

The Lieutenant Commander wrapped up, tapped his papers into a neat and even stack, and returned to his seat. Mardukas stood and dismissed the SRT team, but asked Sousuke and the Algiz team to stay. The young mercenary sat quietly as familiar faces filed past him, some clapping him on the shoulder in acknowledgement of his return. Captain Testarossa took Lieutenant Lemming aside for a moment and whispered with her, then dismissed the older woman with a brisk nod and a touch to the shoulder.

"Captain Hawk, Lieutenant Sexton," Mardukas began, clearing his throat in the manner of someone who is distinctly uncomfortable. "Sergeant Sagara," he added, bestowing a look on the young mercenary that spoke volumes: dislike, distrust, and an incongruous flicker of hope. Sousuke was pretty sure that the dislike was simply personal, and based on his relatively young age. The distrust was logical, since he had been away from the fleet for about four months, and had reappeared on their deck after a long and silent absence, wearing a United States Marine's uniform. The hope, however, baffled him.

"I am sure that you can appreciate the seriousness of the situation we are in. As far as we are aware, this sub and her crew, along with Lieutenant Colonel Courtney and a few scattered members of Mithril's South Atlantic fleet, are all that remains of Mithril's Operations Division. We have been unable to contact our headquarters in Australia, the Mediterranean or Indian Ocean fleets, or any of the scattered Intelligence bases." Mardukas took off his glasses and polished the lenses gently with the loose end of his khaki tie. "We weren't expecting contact with Australia, really. The Sydney office was obliterated. There's really no other word for what happened. Our Pacific base on Merida Island was a loss as well, after Amalgam's attack. We assume the same thing happened to the other fleets from the communications we managed to push through before the strike."

Captain Hawk's face looked tense. "What exactly happened to Merida Island, sir?"

"The Pacific Fleet's base was struck by Mach-6.3 cruise missiles that somehow took advantage of an unprecedented solar storm." Hawk and Sexton exchanged horrified glances, and Hawk mouthed a disbelieving 'Mach-6.3?' at Sexton, who shrugged. "It effectively blinded our satellite arrays, along with just about everything else in orbit above the Eastern hemisphere at the time. They took out all external defensive sites and followed it up with a land attack using three Behemoths, each carrying an adapted sixteen-inch, 50 cal. Mark VII naval gun. We lost several of our SRT members taking out two of the Behemoths. The de Danaan rammed the third." A smile crossed his face at this. It wasn't a nice smile – it looked positively feral.

"Sir – what is a Behemoth?" asked Lieutenant Sexton in his gravelly voice.

Captain Testarossa spoke up from her seat at the desk behind Mardukas. "The M9s you have seen in action are capable of performing almost any action required by a human special forces team – sniping, parachute jumps, aquatic approach, removal of explosives…the list goes on. The Behemoth is…just equipped for destruction. It has no subtlety. It's about 40 meters in height, and several thousand tons - it must be propelled by the Lambda Driver in order to prevent structural collapse."

"Lambda Driver?" Hawk looked thoroughly puzzled. "Commander Clouzot mentioned it in his briefing, but we've never heard of it."

"A weapon, Captain," Tessa said, her face suddenly seeming haggard and gray. "A terrible weapon." She appeared reluctant to elaborate for a moment, then sighed and reached unconsciously for her braid, twisting the tuft at the end around her fingers as she spoke. "It is commonly used to produce shields and projectiles that consist of nothing more than energy and the force of the pilot's will. It bends the rules of physics, and has the capability to make the nuclear bomb look like a hand grenade." She let go of her braid. "You remember mention of a drug?" Sexton and Hawk nodded. "It's used to increase Gamma waves in the brain – that's how a pilot controls the Lambda Driver."

Hawk shook her bronze head in disbelief. "That's unreal," she whispered. "And Amalgam has this weapon? Why haven't they just walked into the U.S. or the U.K. and blown up a city with it, then demanded anything they wanted?"

"We have Sergeant Sagara," Tessa replied, forcing herself to _not_ look over at the young man who sat silently in the back of the briefing room. "He was the pilot of the Arbalest, our own Lambda Driver-equipped Arm Slave."

"He doesn't look drugged-up to me," Sexton muttered, just loud enough to be heard. Hawk rolled her eyes at him, then turned a meditative gaze on Sousuke, as if he might suddenly start foaming at the mouth or fall on the floor twitching, and she wanted to catch it when he did.

"Our Lambda Driver was a little…different," Tessa protested. "Sergeant Sagara had the necessary level of concentration needed to wield the Lambda Diver without the use of drugs." Hawk and Sexton glanced at each other.

"Wait, _was_ the pilot?" Captain Hawk asked, catching onto the terminology. "Who is the pilot now?"

"No one," Sousuke growled from his seat. Mardukas shot him a quelling glare, but he plowed on, wanting to explain without Tessa's carefully veiled information or Mardukas' evasions. "The Arbalest was destroyed in Tokyo. Someone hauled away the wreckage the next day. There was nothing left." Hawk and Sexton both wore expressions of commingled disappointment and relief, for which he couldn't blame them. This was technology straight out of science fiction, a device that defied logic and reason.

"The sergeant is correct. We no longer operate a Lambda Driver-equipped Arm Slave. However, we have overcome its loss and developed tactics that work against equipped opponents." Tessa sounded determined. "On that note, I am dismissing this meeting. Commander, please escort Captain Hawk to the main hangar to meet with Master Sergeant Sax. Sergeant Sagara, you will come with me." She stood and tucked her clipboard under her arm, and watched silently as Mardukas led Hawk and Sexton out the briefing room door.

Sousuke felt a prickle of uneasiness as he watched one short and two tall khaki-clad backs disappear through the hatch, leaving him alone in the briefing room with Tessa. He had had the time to realize a few things during his stay in Namsak, and subsequent extended recovery in Miami, one of which being that Tessa was someone he cared about, but his feelings of fondness for her or the brief, wistful peace he had known with Nami, didn't match the way he felt about Kaname. Tessa, on the other hand, had felt strongly enough about _him_ to ask if he loved Kaname, despite the distraction of plummeting towards the cold Pacific Ocean at the time. He dreaded having to repeat himself, since it had obviously caused her pain…

"Follow me, please, Sergeant," Tessa said briskly, and swept out the hatch as well. Somewhat taken aback, he followed in her wake, and quickly realized they were headed to the hangar. "I am glad you have returned to us, Sergeant," she said quietly, almost inaudibly, since her back was to him as they strode through the passages. "You…have returned, haven't you?" she demanded, stopping in front of him so abruptly that he almost ran her down. She spun around, and he half expected to see tears in her eyes, but she was dry-eyed and determined.

"I'm…not sure," he answered, as honestly as he could. "I need your help to find Kaname Chidori." There, that was as simple as he could make it. They stood in silence for a moment, bathed in the dim yellow glow of the overhead lights in the dark passageway.

"We would like to see her returned as well," Tessa smiled, looking…relieved? Sousuke could feel his brow furrowing in puzzlement. "Mr. Sagara," she said earnestly, "I have to apologize to you." Tessa took a step forward, reached out, and gripped his sleeve. Her high-heeled shoe made a hollow, ringing sound against the plate-metal deck. "I asked you to consider me a friend, and you did. You were a very good friend to me. You saved my life at great risk to yours." She took a deep breath. "I'm afraid I was a very bad friend in return."

"What do you mean?" Sousuke asked, staring down into her serious blue-gray gaze.

"I've had lots of time to think about this, Mr. Sagara, and to come to some…realizations. I…um, did some things that I…am not proud of. I took advantage of my rank and made you very uncomfortable when I came to visit your school," she began, as if going down a list, but Sousuke cut her off.

"No, not at all!" he protested. "It was an honor-"

"Yes, I did. You wouldn't have asked Miss Kaname to stay over as well if you had been …happy." She smiled. Sousuke worked his mouth in a credible imitation of a fish. "And before that, I…took advantage of the circumstances we were in…on the beach…when you trained me for the A.S. fight with Melissa." Sousuke stopped making fish faces and started feeling as if his collar had shrunk in the wash. He distinctly remembered trying to scramble out from beneath her, and getting a waistband full of sand for his trouble.

"You said you wanted my help because you needed a strategy to win," he choked.

Tessa had the grace to blush. "That too," she replied, looking a little ashamed. "I just wanted to spend time with you. I thought if we were together, you might realize how much we had in common…" she sighed. "I _told_ you I was a bad friend." Her smile turned sad and pensive, and she bent her head to examine the fold of pixilated-pattern camouflage she held pinched between her fingers. "I couldn't help being a little glad when you were called away from Tokyo to deal with the Hong Kong situation." She could sense the anger that suddenly darkened his face, and she pressed on hurriedly. This was not going as easily as it had this morning in her bathroom mirror…

"I'll remind you that removing you from bodyguard duty was ultimately not my decision, Mr. Sagara," she said sharply, gripping his sleeve more tightly, as if she could hold onto him if he chose to pull away. He stood stiffly in front of her, waiting for the rest of what she had to say. "I thought it might work out for the best. I was wrong. I hope you've forgiven me for the things I said, and the disrespectful way I treated you. I was being…incredibly selfish. When you offered to stay in Tokyo for half your salary…" she shook her head, eyes downcast. "I think I knew before you did that you loved her. I probably knew before Miss Kaname did, too. She denied it for such a long time."

Sousuke left off staring straight ahead and glanced down at the bowed, silvery head in front of him. For a moment, he contemplated the sky-blue ribbon tying off her braid, the thick cable of her plait as it hung against the back of her skull and brushed her stiffly pressed collar, while his thoughts ran unhindered. Even though he and Kaname had grabbed a moment together on a Tokyo rooftop when his desperation and her fatalistic resignation had somehow led to a confession of their feelings, it hadn't quite been a full-blown admission of romantic love.

Hearing the topic from Tessa's lips, however, cast a new and mildly uncomfortable light on the situation. He…_loved_ Kaname. He loved her, and missed her, and things like Tessa's longing affections or Nami's cheerful hero-worship paled in comparison. The last thing he remembered after being shot by Kurama in Namsak was lying in a pool of his own blood and wishing for Kaname's presence. She possessed a warm, fierce strength that had been a force to draw upon when he had been pressed to his limits. She saw him as a person, instead of a tool. She had taken him from complete social outcast to tolerated social misfit, her own determination and willpower driving her to beat him into the semblance of the person he might have been, if his life had only begun differently. There was just…_something_ about her that made him perfectly happy to contemplate a future of following her everywhere, guarding her from all harm. He winced internally as that particular thought ran through his head…Kaname would definitely not approve of being followed everywhere.

A soft voice brought him back to reality. "Mr. Sagara?" Tessa was peering up into his face with a concerned expression. She must think he was having a PTSD moment. "I'm sorry, I don't mean to press the subject. It's just – did you tell her? Before she…left?"

"Tell whom what?" he responded, a faint guess at her meaning tickling the back of his brain.

"Tell Kaname how you feel?" demanded Tessa, looking slightly uncomfortable.

"…something like that," he muttered, watching her pale fingers crease the fabric of his bloused sleeve.

"Well, then…" she replied, looking uncertain, "That's good." There was a drawn-out, awkward silence. Then, "I wanted you to know…that I knew. And…that I'm happy for you. I am. As your friend." She backed up, releasing his sleeve. "I hope you can forgive me. And that we can be _real_ friends, now." A grin flickered across her face. "No ulterior motives!"

Sousuke felt that smile, the same one that had swum to the surface at the sight of the de Danaan, work its way onto his face and lift the corners of his mouth. "I'd like that," he agreed.

"Excellent!" Tessa chirped, clapping her hands as if the whole matter was neatly tied off and ready to be put away for safekeeping. "Now, let's get going. Lemming is going to think I've knocked myself out by running into a pipe again." With that, she tucked her clipboard against her side again and strode off down the corridor, a bit bouncy, but forgivably so.

* * *

"Well?"

"Well, what?" Sousuke retorted, surveying the crate stoically. He stood in front of a five-meter-square shipping container in the Tuatha de Danaan's primary hangar, arms folded across his chest and feet planted shoulder-width apart. He could take a wild guess at the contents, and felt relatively confident he'd be right. It was, after all, Mithril. He should have seen this coming.

"I'm sure you can guess what this is," sighed Tessa, twirling the end of her braid around her fingers absently.

"Another…Arbalest?" he asked quietly. Her glance flicked guiltily to him, then away. He took a deep breath. "I will _not_-" he began heatedly, but Lieutenant Lemming stepped up to the box and laid an almost protective hand on the side.

"It's not the Arbalest. There's no Lambda Driver," the tall, blond woman said quickly. "It's just an M9 with a basic A.I. There's no bonding to a single pilot, no rebellious personality quirks, no catches." Lemming's face was earnest and open. "There aren't any more M9s outside of what we have in this hangar, and even then we may not be able to use some of them, due to the amount of battle damage and operating hours that have been accruing…"

"Just an M9?" Sousuke repeated, darkly. "No…surprises this time?"

The MIT graduate may have had years and IQ points well beyond Sousuke, but she quailed under his baleful stare. "It's, er…the successor to the ARX-7," Lemming blurted, looking defensive. "OK, it was _supposed_ to have a Lambda Driver, but it doesn't because the developer died-" Tessa made a pained noise and turned her head away. "Oh god! Sorry, Captain, I'm so sorry…"

"Go on, Lieutenant," Tessa said in a stiff voice, gazing off in the opposite direction.

"Ah…yes, let's see…" Lemming flipped through a thick mass of paperwork on her clipboard. "There are some weapons built for the ARX-8, here, that are going to be useless because they relied on the Lambda Driver as a power source-" She was interrupted again as Sousuke snorted in derision.

"That's ridiculous. Even at its best, it was completely unreliable. How they could intend such a thing for the military…" he trailed off, scowling up at the crate.

"I have a spec package for you right here, Sergeant," said Lemming, clearly trying to regain her composure after apparently putting her foot in her mouth up to the knee. Twice. "It will cover operating times, weapons upgrades, any new battle system changes, power outputs, and performance projections, along with potential weak points-"

"Performance projections?" asked Sousuke, taking the packet and flipping back the first few pages to the table of contents. "Projections?" he repeated, frowning. His thick, calloused fingers riffled the pages open to the section he needed. "This Arm Slave hasn't been powered up yet?" He was incredulous. "There have been no tests – no field exercises – of a completely new piece of equipment?"

"There weren't any tests of the Arbalest, either, Sergeant," Tessa said dryly, finally rejoining the conversation. To her credit, her eyes were only a little red. "You are just going to have to treat it as an ordinary M9. Think of Clouzot's machine," she gestured across the hanger to where the black figure of the Falke M9-D crouched, waiting. "It, too, was intended to receive a Lambda Driver. It's a newer model, better performance, improved capabilities – that's all."

Sousuke gazed silently at the paperwork in his hands, thinking. After a moment, he slowly said, "That's fine."

Tessa arched an ironic eyebrow. "'That's fine'?" she echoed. "I hope so, since it's the only spare Arm Slave we have."

"I apologize, Captain. I am simply…relieved that it will…behave." Sousuke flipped the spec packet closed and read the cover page. "What is a Laevatain? It's not a Japanese name…"

Tessa's smile was thin-lipped and grim. Her blue-gray eyes were on him, but he had the feeling she didn't really see him. "It's a reference to Norse mythology. Just as Mithril and the Tuatha de Danaan's names are derived from folklore of Ireland." Sousuke nodded, they had studied Japanese folklore at Jindai High. "Laevatain was a powerful sword forged by the Vanir smith Weylund. It was so powerful that it could fight on its own, and so deadly that the gods finally took it from him. It was to cut the roots of the World Tree, Yggdrasil, which holds our realm in its branches. This would herald the start of Ragnarok, the end of the world."

"Sounds…cheerful," Sousuke managed.

"Actually, Norse mythology was rather upbeat concerning the end of the world. It clearly stated that, while most of humanity and the gods would be killed, some were left alive to repopulate the earth and the heavens and get on with life in a universe reborn. _Quite_ cheerful, really."

Sousuke contemplated the gray shipping container. "This wasn't at Merida…"

"No. We retrieved it - and some personnel - from a research lab in Australia."

"There are new people on the submarine?"

"In a manner of speaking, yes." Tessa crossed her arms in front of her. "I trust them. _Implicitly_," she added, warningly. "You'll get to meet them in a moment."

Apparently, a moment meant right now, as a door opened in the far wall of the hangar bay and two figures strode across the deck towards him. He recognized Wraith immediately, her pale, aquiline features composed in an expression of – well, nothing. Her face gave away neither surprise nor acknowledgement nor confusion. She simply walked up to him, inclined her head briefly at Tessa, and stopped. It was the second girl that was the anomaly, the awkward piece...though after a moment's study, he recognized her, too.

She hadn't really _strode_ across the floor, come to think of it. It had been more of an awkward, sloping shuffle, as if she were trying to hide behind the tall North Korean woman escorting her. She wore a gray jumpsuit like the rest of the mechanics, but aside from 'TDD-1' emblazoned on the left breast pocket, there was no other indication of rank or occupation. She had stepped in close to Tessa, and looked tired, as if she wished to rest her head on the Captain's shoulder. Her face was clean, her long, wavy red hair washed and combed, but the hollow, aged look in her hazel eyes was still there as she raised her chin to peek at him timidly from behind pale, red-gold lashes.

"Sousuke Sagara," Her voice was the same breathy whisper, but this time, it held none of the despair that had colored it when he'd plucked her out of a snowdrift. "You saved my life, in Russia…"

"Rumors of your encounter with a Hind helicopter have been verified, much to Sergeant Major Weber's delight," Tessa said wryly. "He's finally got a chance to re-tell that story as often as he likes to the rest of the crew."

"…it was snowing, and then it was raining fire…" the red-haired girl continued, abstractedly, still gazing at him with a disconcerting lack of blinking. Surely her eyes would get tired…?

"Jessie," Tessa said gently, as if reminding the girl where she was.

"Yes, Tessa?" This was delivered in a surprisingly normal tone, considering the rather disjointed behavior thus far.

"Mr. Sagara, I'm sure you remember Jessie Miller from your mission to the Ukraine? Miss Miller has been recuperating in a Mithril facility, and offered to take up a special project for us several months ago."

"I'm pleased to see you've recovered." He tried to sound as kind and polite as Kaname could wish of him.

"Recovered?" The girl gave him a bitter smile. "I'll recover when I get the bastard who did this to me." Her voice was still eerily soft. "That's why I agreed to finish the Laevatain. I've returned the gift of my life to you by building you a weapon…and with it, you'll hunt down Mr. Silver and kill him."

* * *

**A/N:** I'm back. Yes, I've been distracted. Sorry.

PTSD: Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.


End file.
